Preamble

The House met at a Quarter before Three of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

Southern Railway Bill,

As amended, considered; to be read the Third time.

London, Midland, and Scottish Railway (Superanuation Fund) Bill,

Order [26th May] that the Bill be committed, read, and discharged.

Bill referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

Oral Answers to Questions — EGYPT (ARMY COMMAND).

Mr. LUMLEY: 1.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if any representations have been received from the Egyptian Government as to the futu[...] command of the Egyptian Army; and what reply has been returned?

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Ponsonby): The reply to the first part of the question is in the negative; the latter part, therefore, does not arise.

Mr. LUMLEY: Has the attention of the Under-Secretary been drawn to an answer given by the Egyptian Prime Minister [...] few days ago, in the Chamber of Deputies, to the effect that he would no longer continue to tolerate British officers in command of the Egyptian Army?

Mr. PONSONBY: No, Sir, I have not seen that statement.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRIME MINISTER AND M. POINCARPE (CORRESPONDENCE).

Mr. J. HARRIS: 2.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether it is proposed to publish the correspondence between M. Poincaré and himself; and, if so, whether publication will take place prior to the Whitsuntide Adjournment?

Mr. PONSONBY: Yes, Sir; arrangements are being made for immediate and simultaneous publication of the correspondence, both in this country and in France.

Mr. HARRIS: May we take it that the whole of the correspondence will be published?

Mr. PONSONBY: Yes, the whole of it.

Oral Answers to Questions — CONFERENCE OF AMBASSADORS.

Mr. MOREL: 3.
asked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what are the precise powers now enjoyed and exercised by the Conference of Ambassadors; if the decisions taken from time to time by this body are submitted to the Governments represented upon it before being acted upon; if decisions which may be put in force are determined by majority vote or otherwise; and where the Conference habitually meets?

Mr. PONSONBY: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply made by the Prime Minister to the hon. Member for Hackney (North) on the 25th February, stating that the Ambassadors' Conference was created for the purpose of coordinating the action of the Allied Governments in regard to questions arising out of the interpretation and execution of the Treaties of Peace. His Majesty's Government are of opinion that the powers of the Conference should be confined to that purpose. All decisions of the Conference, which meets at Paris, are taken unanimously. It is left to the discretion of His Majesty's Ambassador to refer for instructions on all points in which he is in doubt as to the wishes of His Majesty's Government.

Oral Answers to Questions — AUSTRIA (WAR MATERIAL).

Mr. MOREL: 4.
asked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if at the end of last year the Conference of Ambassadors, at the request of the
Austrian Government transmitted through the Inter-Allied Commission of Control, granted permission to the Austrian Government to make a considerable extension of its already-existing armament factories; and, if so, whether His Majesty's Government were apprised of the fact and approved of it?

Mr. PONSONBY: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative and the second part does not therefore arise.

Mr. MOREL: Does that reply mean that the Government have no information on the subject?

Mr. PONSONBY: The Government have no information on the subject asked for in the question.

Mr. MOREL: 5.
asked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if His Majesty's Government are aware that the Austrian armament industry has been, during the past 12 months, and still is, supplying quantities of war material to certain of the smaller European States, including, in 1923, 1,000,000 Mauser rifles to Yugo-Slavia, manufactured at the Steyr works, and, between February and 20th April of this year, 116 wagon-loads of infantry ammunition to the same State, produced by the Blumau and Hirtenberg works; and whether, in view of the fact that His Majesty's Government are participants in a loan to Austria, the influence of His Majesty's Government can be exercised in the direction of curtailing this traffic?

Mr. PONSONBY: I am unable to confirm the figures given in the first Part of the question, but am aware that the illicit export of war material from Austria has taken place on various occasions. This matter is being carefully watched by the Organ of Liquidation in Austria, which is the successor of the Inter-Allied Military Commission appointed to supervise the execution of Part V of the Treaty of St. Germain, and the activities of the British member of the Organ are constantly directed to the curtailment of this traffic.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL NAVY.

GRAND FLEET.

Captain Viscount CURZON: 6.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty whether he can state the
number of ships of all classes, respectively, including store-carriers, supply ships, and fleet auxiliaries of all kinds, required for the Grand Fleet in 1917 and 1918?

The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Mr. Ammon): I will, with the Noble Lord's permission, circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT a statement giving the desired figures.

Following is the statement:

SHIPS ATTACHED TO THE GRAND FLEET ON THE 30TH JUNE, 1917, AND 30TH JUNE, 1918.



30th June,



1917.
1918.


Battleships
33
38(a)


Battle cruisers
9
9


Cruisers and light cruisers
39
41


Armed merchant cruisers
22
—


Flotilla leaders and destroyers
115
129


Depot ships
5
5


Submarines
39
38


Fleet minesweepers
33
31


Seaplane carriers and kite balloon ships
6
4


Hospital ships
8
7


Salvage ships
3
—


Boarding steamers
7
1


Minelayers
—
15(b)


Squadron supply ship
1
1


Trawler depot ships
2
2


Naval store carriers
7
9


Defence work carrier
5
1


Miscellaneous store carrier
1
1


Victualling store carrier
1
1


Frozen meat ships
4
3


Ammunition ships
26
23


Ammunition carriers
8
6


Oilers
62
78


Colliers
120
87


Total
556
530


(a) Includes 5 United States battleships.


(b) Includes 11 United States minelayers.

NOTES.—(1) Harwich Force not included.

(2) Boom defence vessels, block ships and auxiliary craft (trawlers, drifters, tugs, etc.) and a few unclassified vessels at ports on which the Grand Fleet was based not included.

(3) Auxiliary craft attendant upon the United States battleships not included.

Boys (TRAINING).

Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: 8.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty how many boys are now under training for His Majesty's Navy, and how many were under training on 28th May, 1914; and why it has been found necessary to detail the battleships "King George V" and "Colossus" as overflow ships to the "Impregnable" training establishment at Devonport?

Mr. AMMON: With regard to the first part of the question, the figures for the 28th May, 1914, are not available. The numbers of seaman class boys under training on the 15th May, 1914, and 15th May, 1924, were 5,712 and 2,803, respectively. The 1914 figures include youths. With regard to the second part of the question, training of boys at Devonport in 1913–14 was carried out in His Majesty's ships "Powerful" and 'Impregnable," and the training A youths was carried out in Devonport Barracks; four seagoing training ships, of the "Edgar" class, based upon Queenstown, were also used. His Majesty's ship "Powerful" has now been done away with and, for reasons of health, a smaller number of boys than formerly is accommodated in His Majesty's ship "Impregnable," while the entry of youths with their shorter period of training has been discontinued on grounds of policy.

YARDCRAFTSATEN (DEVONPORT DOCKYARD).

Major HORE-BELISHA: 9.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty whether he is aware that yard-craftsmen in Devonport Dockyard are on duty 24 hours per day on seven days a week; that the average number of hours per week that they work is 100; that they have no specified time for leaving work; that it is a frequent occurrence for them to do 156 hours on duty at a stretch, whilst on occasion they do from 60 to 70 hours at a stretch, during which time each man has to provide his own food to last for three days, which means, in effect, that each man has to support two homes out of the meagre-wages provided; whether he is aware that the total wages and emoluments of these State workers are £ 6s. 10d. per week of 100 hours; that they are only granted six days' leave per annum, and that only when they can be spared; that they are
not entitled to sick pay; and whether be can see his way to improve the conditions and wages under which these men work?

The CIVIL LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. Hodges): Yardcraftsmen are seafaring men, and may be required to be on board their vessels for 24 hours a day, seven days a week; as regards hours of duty, I am unable to concur in the figures given by the hon. Member, and it should be understood that yardcraftsmen, like other seafaring men, are not always actually at work all the time they spend on board their vessels; an allowance is paid, in addition to wages, whenever the men are required to be on board their vessels for periods in excess of 24 hours, whether in port or out of port; allowances, in addition to regular wages, are also paid when duty is unusually arduous or prolonged; the regular weekly wages of an able seaman amount to 51s. 4d. minimum, and of a stoker, 53s. ld. minimum. The annual leave allowed is as stated; the crews are insured under the National Health Insurance Act in respect of sickness. I may add that the most complete machinery exists, in the shape of Whitley Councils and Committees, for the ventilation of any grievances of any classes of employés through their trade union representatives.

Major HORE-BELISHA: In view of the long hours the men work, and the very low wages paid, will he undertake to look into the question; and may I assume that he does not wish to deprive a Member of Parliament of the right of representing his own constituents?

Mr. HODGES: I am always prepared to go into these cases of long hours and under-payment, but the machinery exists, and I have discovered that the most expeditious way to deal with them is through the trade union representatives on the Whitley Council.

Sir THOMAS BRAMSDON: Has the case of these men come under the Whitley Council recently?

Mr. HODGES: No.

STOKERS AND CHANE DRIVERS.

Mr. W. THORNE: 11.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty if he is aware of the discontent in the minds of
a large number of men working in the Government dockyards, mole especially stokers and crane drivers, in consequence of the long delay in getting any of their grievances settled, even if they have been considered by the Admiralty Joint Industrial Council; if he is aware that the Joint Industrial Council only meet about every four weeks, and if the officials of the Admiralty desire to postpone the case it is another four weeks before it can be heard; if he is aware of the dissatisfaction in connection with the classification of skilled labourers; and whether he will be prepared to receive a deputation of the men in question about the matter?

Mr. HODGES: The answer to the first part, of the question is in the negative. The council meetings are held about every four weeks, and no application has been made by the workmen's representatives to have the meetings convened more frequently. I have no doubt that the trades union members of the Joint Industrial Council would move for expedition if they considered the present arrangements unsatisfactory.

OFFICERS (MARRIAGE ALLOWANCE).

Major HORE-BELISHA: 14.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty whether, seeing that the question of granting marriage allowance to naval officers has been for a long time under consideration, he can now make a pronouncement upon the subject?

Mr. AMMON: I regret I am not yet in a position to make any pronouncement.

Major HORE-BELISHA: Can the Parliamentary Secretary say when he is likely to be able to make a pronouncement, and will he do so before the reductions take place?

Mr. AMMON: I am afraid I cannot.

OFFICERS' PAY.

Major HORE-BELISHA: 15.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty, with reference to the proposed reductions in officers' pay, whether he is aware that in July, 1919, when the new scales were promulgated, the cost of living was 105 per cent. above that of 1914, whereas it is now about 78 per cent. above that of 1914, which is equivalent
to a difference of 13.1 per cent.; and whether, seeing that the Order 2,483a stated that 20 per cent. of the new rates of pay and retired pay for officers should he considered as due to the high cost of living and subject after five years to change, either upwards or downwards, according as the cost of living rises or falls, he can see his way to act within the terms of the Order referred to and decrease the pay only by one-fifth of 13.1 per cent., namely, 2.6 per cent., at the outside?

Mr. AMMON: I regret that I am unable to agree in the hon. Member's calculation. It was the clear intention of His Majesty's Government in 1919, that, if prices fell to the pre-War level, 20 per cent. of the present pay of officers should be withdrawn. Under the hon. Member's calculation, approximately 10 per cent. only could be withdrawn in that event, and the full 20 per cent. could not be withdrawn until the actual cost of living fell to zero.

Viscount CURZON: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us whether, before deciding to reduce the pay, the fact was realised that the cost of living figures do not include rent, rates and taxes?

Mr. AMMON: All those facts were taken into consideration.

Oral Answers to Questions — GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.

ADMIRALTY.

Mr. TREVELYAN THOMSON: 7.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty if he will give particulars of the number of persons employed on the Admiralty staff to-day and the corresponding number in 1914, and also the total personnel of the Navy on each of these dates?

Mr. AMMON: I will, with the hon. Member's permission, circulate the figures in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

The figures are as follow:

The figures of the Admiralty staff are


July, 1914
…
…
2,072


1st May, 1924
…
…
3,414

The following table gives the details:

—
Naval Officers.
Civilians.


Permanent.
Temporary.


Men.
Women.
Men.
Women.


1st May, 1924
…
…
…
…
262
2,060
259
610
223


July, 1914
…
…
…
…
152
1,821
99
—
—

The figures for the personnel of the Navy are

15th May, 1924
…
98955


15th July, 1914
…
146,047

WAR BONUS.

Viscountess ASTOR: 49.
asked the Prime Minister when payment will be made to those affected by the decision in the case of Sutton v. Rex?

The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Hartshorn): I have been asked to reply. £1,220,000 has already been paid to men clearly affected by the decision. Further test actions are about to come before the Courts in respect of men not covered by the decision referred to; and with regard to these I must refer the Noble Lady to the reply given to the questions on the subject asked by the hon. Member for Dulwich and the right hon. Member for the Colchester Division of Essex on the 15th instant, a copy of which I will send her.

Mr. BETTERTON: As this is a very serious matter for these men, will the right hon. Gentleman expedite it?

Mr. HARTSHORN: I know there has been a very unfortunate delay in this matter, but I am pleased to say that Petitions of Right were presented yesterday and we expect them to be served within the course of the next few days. Replies will have to be furnished within 28 days. Immediately these replies have been furnished application will be made to the Court to expedite the hearing. There will be no delay that can possibly be avoided.

Major HORE-BELISHA: As this question relates to a judgment already delivered, what has the new Petition of Right to do with the men who are affected by that judgment?

Mr. G. SPENCER: Have technical objections been raised to the claims of a
great many of the men who thought that they were covered by this decision?

Mr. HARTSHORN: This is a legal tangle which will have to be left to the lawyers.

CRUISER CONSTRUCTION (AUSTRALIA).

Mr. J. HARRIS: 10.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty whether the Australian Government has now taken a final decision with reference to the construction of cruisers; whether these cruisers will be equal in speed, gun-power and displacement to the five cruisers now building; and whether, in view of this decision of the Australian Government, it is proposed to modify in any way the Naval programme of the Government?

Mr. AMMON: His Majesty's Government have no information as to the present position regarding the proposal of the Commonwealth Government to construct two cruisers. With regard to the last part of the question, I would refer the hon. Member to my reply of the 2nd April to the hon. Member for Westbury.

Viscount CURZON: Is it not a fact that these two cruisers are in substitution of two ships which are well over 50 years of age, coal burning and of very inferior speed?

Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Are we to understand that these two cruisers are to be laid down or are they not, and if they are laid down are they not in addition to our five?

Mr. AMMON: The answer to both these supplementary questions is that this is a matter for the Australian Government, and we have no definite information.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNEMPLOYMENT.

JUVENILE CENTRES.

Mrs. WINTRINGHAM: 16.
asked the Minister of Labour whether, since the present scheme of financing Juvenile Unemployment Centres bears with hardship on the teachers for the purposes of the Superannuation Act, he will consider financing them through the Board of Education?

The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Trevelyan): I have been asked to reply. The grant for Juvenile Unemployment Centres is made out of the Vote for the Relief of Unemployment. The question of making arrangements which would bring the financing of these Centres within the scope of the Vote of the Board of Education is one which I am discussing with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour, but I am not in a position to make any announcement.

Mr. HOPE SIMPSON: Is it not a fact that these teachers are not entitled to he superannuated?

Mr. TREVELYAN: Yes.

Mr. GRAHAM WHITE: 27.
asked the Minister of Labour if there are any statistics available to show the average period of training received by unemployed young persons at juvenile unemployment centres?

The MINISTER of LABOUR (Mr. Shaw): I am afraid that I have no information other than that given to the hon. Member on 22nd May. I propose, however, to ask the local education authorities concerned whether they have kept any statistics of the kind which the hon. Member has in mind, and I will communicate the result of my inquiries to him.

RELIEF SCHEMES (FGREIGN MATERIALS).

Mr. HANNON: 17.
asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that the West Riding County Council have recently purchased a quantity of railway material and wagon works of foreign manufacture for use in the State-aided relief schemes under their jurisdiction; and whether he will consider the introduction of Regulations whereby State-aided relief schemes, resulting from the necessity of finding employment for the large number of men
at present out of work in this country, should be entirely supplied with plant and accessories manufactured in Great Britain?

The MINISTER of TRANSPORT (Mr. Gosling): I have been asked to answer this question. I became aware of the purchase of the plant, to which the hon. Member refers, after the estimate had been accepted by the West Riding County Council. As inquiry showed that in the case of some items the prices quoted for British plant were no less than 50 per cent. above the foreign quotation, I did not feel justified in withholding approval of the Council's action. It will be seen that the circumstances in this case were exceptional. I may add that one of the conditions now attached to all grants made from the Road Fund towards road works expedited for the relief of unemployment is that, not only must all contracts be placed in this country, but all materials and plant used must be of British manufacture, unless the Minister of Transport agrees otherwise. While every effort should be made to assist home industries local authorities must be able to protect themselves against possible combinations to keep up prices.

Mr. HOPE: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether this plant came from countries with a low exchange?

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: And from protected countries.

Mr. HANNON: Is the hon. aware that German firms are writing to the muncipal authorities of this country calling attention to the reduction of the export duty from 26½ per cent, to 5 per cent., and offering cheaper materials on this account?

Mr. DICKSON: Can the Minister of Transport tell us whether the personnel of the West Riding County Council is Socialist or anti-Socialist?

Mr. REMER: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Lord Privy Seal made a most definite statement in this House in reply to a question that no money would be advanced of any kind unless the materials were bought in this country?

Mr. GOSLING: I do not think that is what he said. I am all for doing the work in this country, but local bodies, and, in fact, everybody else, ought to he protected against rings.

Mr. REMER: Has the hon. Gentleman any evidence whatever that there is any ring in this case?

MOTOR INDUSTRY.

Mr. HANNON: 19.
asked the Minister of Labour whether the classification according to the occupation of persons insured under the Unemployment Insurance Acts is so arranged as to show the total number of persons engaged in the production and repair of motor vehicles, aircraft, etc.: and, if not, whether the classification only includes persons employed, so far as production is concerned, in factories where motor vehicles are completed?

Mr. SHAW: The classification group which includes the motor industry is composed of all insured persons employed by firms engaged wholly or mainly in the construction and repair of motor cars, motor lorries, motor omnibuses, motor cycles, cycles and aircraft. It also includes workers at motor repair garages, It excludes persons engaged in the manufacture of cycle and motor accessories. The persons classified under this group are not limited to those employed in factories where motor vehicles are completed, but embrace all insured persons, including clerks, maintenance staff, etc., who are in the employ of firms concerned with any stage of manufacture, provided they come generally under the above description. I am sending the hon. Member a copy of the official "Classified List of Industry Groups," which gives further particulars.

Mr. PALMER: Can the right hon. Gentleman give the number of categories?

Mr. SHAW: If the hon. Member will put a question down I will give him the information.

Captain BOWYER: 25.
asked the Minister of Labour how many cases of men recently employed in the motor industry but now unemployed have reported to the Employment Exchanges and what steps is he taking to find these men employment?

Mr. SHAW: The latest analysis of unemployed persons by industries relates to 28th April, and that for the end of May will not be available for some little time. In these circumstances, I cannot say whether there has been any net increase in unemployment in the motor
industry since the end of April. As soon as the information is available, I will communicate with the hon. Member. As regards the last. part of the question, I can add nothing to the reply given to a similar question on previous occasions.

Captain BOWYER: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman is going to take special steps to find employment for the men whose unemployment is wholly due to the recent policy of the Government in regard to the McKenna Duties?

Mr. SHAW: I am not admitting the statement, that is so frequently made, as to unemployment arising out of the policy of the Government, but I am prepared to take any steps that are possible to find employment for anybody who is unemployed, from whatever cause.

Captain BRASS: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell us whether he has any definite plan for these people in the event—

Mr. SPEAKER: That is a hypothetical question.

Captain BOWYER: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that last week the Parliamentary Secretary to his Ministry directed my attention, in reply to a question, to the increase in the number of men in this industry who are going to the Exchanges, and how comes it that he now says that no increase has been noticed?

Mr. SHAW: All that I said was, that I was not aware that there had been any net increase in unemployment, but that the figures were not yet prepared, and that, as soon as they are prepared, I will communicate them to the hon. and gallant Member.

Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURY: 29.
asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that the unemployment Returns for the week ending 19th May have increased considerably in the Midland area; and will he state the industries which show increases?

Mr. SHAW: The number of persons on the 19th May, 1924. recorded on the registers of Employment Exchanges in the Midlands area was 127,047, an increase of 601 as compared with the 12th May. As statistics on an industrial basis are prepared only at monthly intervals, the most recent date being 28th April, it is not yet
possible to state the industries which show recent increases or decreases in the numbers unemployed. If the hon. and gallant Member will put down a question about the middle of June, I will gladly give the information.

Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in the six towns in the Midland area whose chief industry is the making of motor cars, or spare parts of motors, the numbers of unemployed have increased by 2,035?

Mr. SHAW: I am not aware of that fact. I am aware that there has been an increase of one-half per cent. in the area spoken of It is my desire, as keen as that of the hon. Member, to get to know the exact facts at the earliest possible moment so that the House may know what the position is.

BENEFIT (WAITING AND QUALIFYING PERIODS).

Mr. AYLES: 22.
asked the Minister of Labour what the cost would be, first, to reduce the waiting time to qualify for unemployed pay to three days and, second, to limit the need to qualify on the present basis to one period in each six months?

Mr. SHAW: It is difficult to form an estimate, but the cost under the first head, at the rates proposed under the Unemployment Insurance Bill now before the House, would probably be from four to four and a-half million pounds per annum, Under the second head the cost is very uncertain, but I should hesitate to put it at less than £3,000,000.

Mr. AYLES: 23.
asked the Minister of Labour if he is prepared to consider the position of men and women on half time who work and stand off on alternate weeks during the year; and whether he will consider the best means for reducing the hardship on those who are thus unemployed for several months in the year and yet unentitled to receive unemployment pay?

Mr. SHAW: Insured contributors who work and stand off in alternate weeks are already entitled to benefit in respect of idleness, except for the first of such weeks, which forms the waiting week.

Mr. WHITE: is the right hon. Gentleman fully seized of the hardship arising to those insured persons
whose incidence of employment may leave them with a gap of several weeks?

Mr. AYLES: Is it not true that a man, after he has worked three weeks, and having qualified, has to qualify again?

Mr. SHAW: Yes, but this question speaks of people who stand off in alternate weeks, which is a different question.

Mr. G. SPENCER: Can the right hon. Gentleman say why, if one member of this Fund is entitled to out-of-work pay if he stands off in alternate weeks, another member, who can only make two days a week over a long period, is not so entitled?

BUILDING TRADES.

Mr. T. THOMSON: 24.
asked the Minister of Labour if he will give particulars of the maximum and minimum rates of unemployment in the building trades during each of the last five years and during the current year?

Mr. SHAW: As the reply is in tabular form, I will, with the permission of the hon. Member, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the reply:

Highest and lowest monthly rates of unemployment among insured work-people in the building industry record[...]d in the years 1918 to 1923, and in the first four months of 1924:



Highest.
Lowest.


1918
…
…
…
5.3
0.5


1919
…
…
…
11.4
4.2


1920
…
…
…
7.3
2.0


1921
…
…
…
19.8
8.8


1922
…
…
…
21.5
14.2


1923
…
…
…
20.l
11.3


1924
…
…
…
14.9
8.7

WOMEN IN INSURED TRADEF.

Mr. E. BROWN: 26.
asked the Minister of Labour if he will give the latest estimate of the number of women who are insured persons in the unemployment insurance scheme; how many of them are estimated to be unemployed; and how many of them were in receipt of unemployment benefit at the last date for which he has statistics?

Mr. SHAW: The estimated number of women in insured trades in Great Britain is 2£ millions, of whom 225,026 were
registered at Employment Exchanges as unemployed on 28th April. The number of women with claims to unemployment benefit current at that date was 183,718, Many of these women are textile workers on short time.

Viscountess ASTOR: Have the Government any plan for these women?

Mr. SPEAKER: That does not really arise out of the question.

INSTRUCTION COURSES.

Mr. ATHOLL ROBERTSON: 32.
asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that unemployed men who are drawing benefits for self, wife, and children, and who have the opportunity of learning a trade at the Northern Polytechnic, cannot take advantage of this offer, as unemployment benefit is immediately stopped if they do; and, seeing that juveniles must attend a course of instruction to become eligible for unemployment benefit, can he see his way to extend the same system to adults who are anxious to learn trades, and who, if they could depend on unemployment benefit while training as artisans, would have much greater opportunities of getting back into work when trained?

Mr. SHAW: If the hon. Member will send me particulars of the cases he has in mind, I will have inquiries made. While the final decision on such questions rests with the Umpire, the position is that, in general, persons undergoing instruction at technical institutes are not thereby disqualified for benefit, provided, of course, that they remain available for employment.

POOR LAW AREAS (FINANCIAL RELIEF).

Mr. W. THORNE: 66.
asked the Minister of Health whether he can state the approximate financial relief that West Ham, Birmingham, Sheffield, Manchester, Middlesbrough, and other heavily rated Poor Law areas in South Wales will receive under the new Unemployment Insurance Bill?

Mr. SHAW: I have been asked to reply. The increase of benefits proposed by the Unemployment Insurance Bill is estimated to amount to roughly £10,000,000 per annum with a live regis-
ter of 1,000,000. It is not possible to say how much of this sum will be reflected directly in reduction of the poor rate, but obviously it must represent directly or indirectly a substantial measure of assistance in towns with heavy unemployment.

Mr. THORNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, so far as West Ham is concerned, the Clerk of the board of guardians anticipates that West Ham is to get about £68,000 from the Bill, and that this assistance is not adequate to meet the situation?

Mr. SHAW: I am not aware of the facts, and in any event the case of West Ham and its council is a matter for the Ministry of Health.

Mr. AYLES: May I ask whether there has been any direct or indirect encouragement from his Department or any other Department to boards of guardians to reduce the relief which they are giving to unemployed workmen, in order to save, the rates at the expense of the Unemployment Insurance Fund?

Mr. SPEAKER: That is a separate question.

WAGES (COST-OF-LIVING BASIS).

Mr. HANNON: 18.
asked the Minister of Labour how many persons in this country have their wages regulated in accordance with a sliding scale dependent on the cost of living; and whether it is contemplated making any provision whereby the workpeople so affected will be enabled to enjoy the advantages of the reduced taxation under the present year's Budget?

Mr. SHAW: The number of persons covered by agreements at present in operation between employers and work-people providing for the adjustment of wages with reference to variations in the official cost-of-living index number, is estimated to be between 2£ and 3 millions. As regards the latter part of the question, I would refer the hon. Member to the reply, a copy of which I am sending to him, given on 20th May to a similar question by the hon. Member for the Hexham Division (Mr. Finney).

MATERNITY CONVENTION.

Mr. WHITELEY: 20.
asked the Minister of Labour whether it is the intention of the Government to bring the Maternity Convention decisions before the House for ratification during the present Session; and, if not, whether he can give any assurance that they will be dealt with during the Autumn Session?

Mr. SHAW: I am still in consultation with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health regarding the policy to be adopted by His Majesty's Government in ccnnection with this draft Convention. I cannot at present make any further statement.

Mr. ORMSBY-GORE: Is it not a fact that no single country in the world has given effect to the proposals of this Convention, and will the British representative, at the next meeting at Geneva of the Bureau International de Travail, raise the point and get a more practical Convention to which other countries would agree?

Oral Answers to Questions — EX-SERVICE MEN.

MINISTRY OF LABOUR.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir JOSEPH NALL: 21.
asked the Minister of Labour how many of the ex-service members of the staff in his Department now under or about to receive notice of dismissal are single and how many are married men?

Mr. SHAW: 151 ex-service members of the temporary staff of the Ministry are now—mainly as a result of the steady diminution in unemployment—under or about to receive notice of dismissal, though it is probable that further employment will be found by the Department for a proportion of these officers before their notice expires. Of these 151, 74 are single and 77 married men.

Sir J. NALL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, in one office in Manchester alone, 10 out of 17 ex-service men are under notice, two of them being disabled; and that only four have been offered any alternative employment?

Mr. SHAW: I am not aware of those facts. The hon. and gallant Member did not give them to me in order that I could inquire into the case. I will inquire into it, but the real reason for these officers
having to leave is that unemployment is decreasing steadily, and there is no work for them.

Sir J. NALL: Am I to understand that that is why 10 out of 17 are to be dismissed in one office alone?

Mr. SHAW: The dismissals take place on a method arranged between the men themselves and the officials, in strict accordance with the substitution scheme definitely approved by both sides.

Sir J. NALL: Does the right hon. Gentleman take steps to ensure that any particular office is not penalised in the interest of some other office?

Mr. SHAW: Yes, everything that can be done is done to carry out in full honesty the agreement arrived at.

UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFIT.

Mr. SMEDLEY CROOKE: 30.
asked the Minister of Labour whether, in view of the widespread distress prevalent amongst ex-service officers and men of like educational qualification, he is prepared to extend to them the uncovenanted benefit of the unemployment insurance fund?

Mr. SHAW: Ex-service officers and men of like educational qualification are eligible for unemployment benefit, subject to the same conditions as other applicants. I regret that I cannot see my way to make proposals for the grant of uncovenanted benefit to such of them as cannot satisfy these conditions.

POOR LAW RELIEF.

Mr. MILLS: 39.
asked the Minister of Health if he is now in a position to state the number of ex-service men and dependants in receipt of Poor Law relief?

The MINISTER of HEALTH (Mr. Wheatley): I have now received the returns from the several boards of guardians, and I hope shortly to issue a paper giving a summary of the figures obtained.

Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: Will it give particulars of the numbers of aliens in receipt of relief?

Mr. WHEATLEY: It will give all the particulars contained in the return.

Mr. MILLS: The question refers specifically to ex-service men and their dependants. Is it in order for an hon. Member to drag in the question of aliens?

PASSENGER TRAINS (LAVATORY ACCOMMODATION).

Mr. R. WILSON: 36.
asked the Minister of Health if his attention has been directed to the inadequate lavatory accommodation afforded to passengers taking long journeys on railway trains coming by excursion to the British Empire Exhibition; and whether he will make representations to the companies in the matter?

Mr. GOSLING: I have been asked to answer this question. One such case has been brought to my notice, and I have, been in communication with the railway company concerned in regard to it. The company have explained that, in view of the pressure brought upon them to provide trains for people wishing to visit Wembley and their anxiety to meet such requests, it is not possible in all cases to provide corridor accommodation on excursion trains, but that where it is not provided they arrange that there shall be a proportion of the coaches fitted with lavatories, and that arrangements are made in such cases to stop the trains at suitable places on the journey for the accommodation of passengers, and I am communicating with the other companies calling their attention to this matter.

Mr. BUCHANAN: Is my right hon. Friend aware that not only in connection with the exhibition, but on journeys say between Glasgow and London, not only is the lavatory accommodation inadequate, but the supply of drinking water, and I should like to ask him to take steps to see that it is supplied?

Mr. GOSLING: I will communicate with the railway companies if hon. Members will give me specific cases.

HOLLAND (COTTON TRADE DISPUTE).

Mr. WADDINGTON: 31.
asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that the dispute in the Dutch cotton textile trade has been settled by a reduction in
wages of 7½ per cent., and an increase in working hours from 48 to 50½ and whether, seeing that Holland was a party to the Washington Labour Conference and passed an Act legalising the 48-hour week, and that the Dutch Government is now licensing this extension of working hours, he proposes to take any steps to bring the action of that Government before the International Labour Committee of the League of Nations?

Mr. SHAW: I have no information as to the facts in this dispute. In any event, I would point out that in the absence of our ratification of the Eight Hours Convention it would not be possible, even if it were desirable, for His Majesty's Government to take the action suggested.

Mr. REMER: Do the Government intend to ratify the Convention?

Mr. SHAW: I hope to present a Bill shortly for that purpose.

Mr. REMER: When will it be presented?

Mr. SHAW: As early as possible.

Mr. WADDINGTON: In view of the importance of an increase in the working hours in Holland and a decrease in wages, will the right hon. Gentleman take steps to find out the accuracy of the information—such steps as will benefit British labour?

Mr. SHAW: Yes, I will certainly take all steps to get this information, and, as I happen, from many years' experience, to know how unreliable statements are about Holland, I will take particular pains to Jet accurate information.

RUSSIA (TRADE FACILITIES AND EXPORT CREDIT SCHEMES).

Mr. COMPTON: 33.
asked the Minister of Labour if, and when, he intends to apply the Trade Facilities and Export Credit Schemes to Soviet Russia?

Mr. SHAW: I understand that there is no statutory or other provision excluding the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics from the operation of the Trade Facilities Scheme. As regards the Export Credits Scheme, there is no statutory limitation as to the countries for which credits may be given, but I am informed that the
Regulations at present governing the scheme exclude the grant of credits in the case of shipments to Russia. There are difficulties in the way of extending the Export Credits Scheme to Russia, but it is hoped that these difficulties will soon be removed.

Sir PHILIP LLOYD-GREAME: In applying either of these schemes to Russia will it be done subject to the same conditions under which they are applied to other countries?

Mr. SHAW: The same conditions, exactly.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Why did the right hon. Gentleman state, on Thursday last, that the scheme had been extended to Russia?

Mr. SHAW: Frankly, it was a mistake.

Viscountess ASTOR: Will the right hon. Gentleman explain to me why a Socialist Government needs capital?

Mr. SPEAKER: This is not the time for evening classes in economics.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSING.

SUBSIDY.

Mr. W. FOOT MITCHELL: 34.
asked the Minister of Health the number of cases in which he has refused the housing subsidy on the ground that the needs of the district concerned can be met by individual enterprise; and is he aware that more houses could be provided if the housing subsidy were given to all genuine builders, irrespective of whether or not houses are built locally by wealthy individuals who do not need the subsidy?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I should like to express my regret to the House that, through an accident, neither my colleague nor I was able to be present yesterday to answer questions. I hope the House will accept my apology
I have gone into this question in detail and, as the answer is necessarily rather long, I will, with the hon. Member's permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

The answer is as follows:

I assume that the hon. Member has in mind the application of a district council in regard to which he recently communi-
cated with me. I have had further correspondence with the council in question, and have informed them that, provided they can formulate properly safeguarded proposals for the assistance of private enterprise in their district, I should be prepared to consider favourably an application for approval of a scheme which would enable the council to deal with suitable cases that may come before them. The hon. Member will be aware that under the Housing, etc. Act, 1923, I am required, before approving the proposals of a local authority to grant assistance to private enterprise, to be satisfied that the need for houses cannot be met without assistance under the Act. Approval to the general schemes of local authorities for granting assistance to private enterprise has been withheld in two cases.

SMALL DWELLINGS ACQUISITION ACT.

Mr. R. MORRISON: 37
asked the Minister of Health, in view of the fact that, within the county of Middlesex, one town council and six urban district councils have formally adopted the Small Dwellings Acquisition Act but have made no advances under it, whether, in the interests of those who are anxious to purchase their houses under the Act, he will make representations to those authorities that they should either apply the Act or rescind their resolution of adoption, and thereby enable the Middlesex County Council to do so?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I am advised that a council, having once become the local authority under the Acts, has no power to divest itself of its responsibilities. Communications have been addressed to local authorities with regard to the application of these Acts, but I will communicate with the seven local authorities in question.

Mr. LINFIELD: Has the Minister any power to compel local authorities to adopt the Act?

Mr. WHEATLEY: So far as I know, I have no power.

HOUSES FOR SALE.

Mr. MILLS: 38.
asked the Minister of Health if he will take steps to initiate legislation that will result in the occupation of over 250,000 houses at present held for sale; whether subsidies are in prospect to builders who intend building for sale
only; and what steps he proposes to take to deal with those builders who have houses kept for sale which have received the subsidy?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I am not aware of the basis of the figures given by my hon. Friend. After careful consideration, I have come to the conclusion that I cannot undertake to introduce legislation this Session to prevent the holding of houses for sale, and I can only concur with the hon. Member in regretting that not even the provision of subsidies has made it possible for the private builder generally to build houses for letting. With regard to the other point raised, I would suggsst that the hon. Member should await the introduction of the Government's housing proposals.

Mr. W. THORNE: Will the right hon. Gentleman or the Government take steps to prevent houses being decontrolled as soon as they become vacant?

Mr. W. GREENWOOD: In view of the fact that a great many owners of houses are compelled to sell their houses, owing to the slump in trade, will the right hon. Gentleman advise the municipalities to buy the houses, and let them?

HOUSES COMPLETED.

Mr. EMLYN-JONES: 41.
asked the Minister of Health the number of houses completed during the last 12 months by private enterprise, and also by local authorities; and the number of non-subsidy houses with a rateable value of less than £52 per annum completed during the same period?

Mr. WHEATLEY: During the 12 months ended 31st March last 14,371 houses were completed by local authorities and 4,293 by private enterprise with State assistance. In addition, approximately 66,000 houses of a larger type and of a rateable value not exceeding £52 in the provinces and £70 in the Metropolitan Police District were erected by private enterprise.

HOUSING ACT, 1923.

Mr. FRANKLIN: 54.
asked the Minister of Health the number of houses built under the Housing Act, 1923; the cost per house; the amount of subsidy paid for each house or group of houses; and the districts where such houses were erected

Mr. WHEATLEY: Up to the 1st instant 10,519 houses had been completed in England and Wales under the Housing, etc., Act, 1923. These houses are situate in the districts of some 600 local authorities all over the country. Information is not available as to the cost of the houses erected by private enterprise, but the average prices of all houses included in contracts let by local authorities under the Act up to the end of April were £379 for non-parlour houses and £432 for parlour houses. The Exchequer subsidy payable in respect of those houses is at the rate of £6 a year for 20 years for each house.

SUBSIDY AND NON-SUBSIDY HOUSES.

Mr. EMLYN-JONES: 55.
asked the Minister of Health the number of subsidy houses actually under construction by private enterprise and by local authorities, and the number of non-subsidy houses below £52 per annum rateable value actually in course of erection?

Mr. WHEATLEY: The number of subsidy houses under construction on the 1st instant were: 24,270 by private enterprise; 11,731 by local authorities. On the 31st March last approximately 36,000 houses of a rateable value not exceeding £52 in the provinces and £70 in the Metropolitan Police District were under construction by private enterprise without the aid of subsidy.

BUILDING MATERIALS (PRICES).

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: 57.
asked the Minister of Health when he will be in a position to inform the House as to his proposals for preventing profiteering in materials used in the building industry during the course of His Majesty's Government's house-building programme?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I hope to be able to lay the proposals of the Government before the House before the House rises for Whitsuntide.

Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Will it take the form of a Bill?

Sir K. WOOD: Does the right hon. Gentleman propose to introduce this as a separate Bill apart from the Housing Bill?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I understand that the Lord Privy Seal has promised to make a statement to the House to-morrow on this question, and I do not wish to anticipate that statement.

BUILDING GUILDS.

Mr. BAKER: 61.
asked the Minister of Health whether the veto on the granting to the building guilds of housing contracts of the form known as basic sum contracts, originally approved by his Department under the late housing scheme, is still in force; and whether local authorities are free under the present housing scheme, and will be free under that now in contemplation, to enter into contracts with the building guilds on the basic sum principle with his approval?

Mr. WHEATLEY: This question is under consideration, and I hope to be able to find means of enlisting the help of the building guilds, but I am unable to make a statement at the present time. I may say generally that I think it is very desirable that contracts should be on a lump sum basis.

Mr. BAKER: How soon does the right hon. Gentleman think that he will be able to announce a decision?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I am afraid that I am not in a position to say how soon.

PENNY RATE (EXCESS PAYMENTS).

Mr. FRANKLIN: 62.
asked the Minister of Health whether he can state the number of houses in respect of which the Exchequer paid all excess over the ld. rate in the years 1020, 1921, 1922 and 1923, without specifying the date when those houses were completed?

Mr. WHEATLEY: The number of houses completed since the beginning of the scheme or under erection at the end of each year, in respect of which the annual deficit in excess of the Id. rate is borne by the Exchequer, is as follows:

1920
…
…
…
70,335


1921
…
…
…
146,122


1922
…
…
…
166,238


1923
…
…
…
172,747

Mr. EMLYN-JONES: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me the monetary charge per annum which is involved in respect of those houses?

Mr. WHEATLEY: Yes, I can give that information if I am asked the question.

BRICKS.

Mr. W. THORNE: 65.
asked the Minister of Health the number of brick-
fields now making machine-made and hand-made bricks in England, Scotland, and Wales; the number of bricks now being made and if they are making at their full capacity; and whether the Government have considered the advisability of controlling brickfields for the Government's housing scheme so as to prevent a rise in the price of bricks?

Mr. WHEATLEY: As the answer is somewhat long, I will, with the permission of my hon. Friend, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the answer:

Records are not available to enable distinction to be drawn between the numbers of bricks produced by machine-made and hand-made processes. The approximate number of brickfields producing or temporarily closed was estimated by a Committee of the Ministry of Reconstruction in January, 1918, as follows, namely:

England
…
…
…
…
1,125


Wales
…
…
…
…
46

The present rate of production is variously estimated at between 2,500 millions and 4,000 millions a year, and from a recent Report by the Building Industry Committee it would appear that the full capacity has not yet been reached. The Government have had under consideration various means by which undue rises in prices of bricks may be obviated, and proposals with this end in view will be made in due course. With regard to figures relating to Scotland I would refer my hon. Friend to the Under-Secretary for Health in Scotland.

OVERCROWDING AND TUBERCULOSIS.

Mr. BLACK: 67.
asked the Minister of Health whether he will state the policy of the Government with respect to the compulsory segregation of persons seriously affected with tuberculosis and in an infectious and incurable condition; and whether he can promise adequate protection to the children and near relatives of such persons who are, through lack of housing accommodation, forced to live in close proximity to such diseased persons?

Mr. WHEATLEY: As regards the first part of the question, this matter will be considered in connection with any proposals for the amendment of the Public
Health Acts, As regards the second part, it is for the local sanitary authorities to take all such steps as are practicable to prevent the spread of infection.

Mr. BLACK: Does the right hon. Gentleman say that the Department can do nothing to prevent the premature death of hundreds of people who are caused to die through the unsatisfactory local housing accommodation?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I am sure that the hon. Member will see that very vital principles are involved in his question. First of all, there is the interference by the central authority in the work of the local authority; and, secondly, the right of the local authority to interfere with the liberty of the subject.

RENT REDUCTION (SUBSIDISED HOUSES).

Mr. SMITH-CARINGTON: 68.
asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that on two occasions the Stamford Town Council have recommended a reduction in the rents of the houses built by them under the housing assisted scheme Regulations; that in Peterborough three reductions have been sanctioned; that in Stamford there is a great disparity between the rents of the council houses and other working-class houses of a similar type; if he is prepared to sanction some reduction in these rents; and, if not, will he state the reason for such refusal?

Mr. WHEATLEY: The rents of the houses at Stamford were reduced with the approval of my Department in July, 1922. I will have inquiry made into the present position and will communicate with the hon. Member later

CONCRETE BLOCKS.

Mr. HARDIE: 70.
asked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the inadequate supply and the increase in the price of bricks, he will arrange for the manufacture of hollow concrete building blocks; and if he is aware that this production of building materials can be carried on all the year round in any of the existing Government War buildings not in use at present?

Mr. WHEATLEY: As at present proposed, it is not the intention of the Government to undertake the direct manufacture of building materials.

Mr. HARDIE: In view of the unemployment, and the fact that this would immediately take men off the streets and put them into work, why is it that the Minister of Health or the Government do not do something to take some men off the streets?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I am not questioning the wisdom of employing men in the manufacture of these blocks. I have been asked a question only as to whether the Government were the proper authority to do it One of the reasons for not doing it is that a Government is not a builder of houses. This work should be undertaken by the local authorities or by the builders.

Mr. HARDIE: My question does not deal with the building of houses but with the manufacture of building materials. and I want an answer.

Mr. PRINGLE: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that his individualist practice falls behind the practice of the Coalition Minister of Health, who set the Government to building houses?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I am submitting that it is much wiser to allow a local authority in its own area to make concrete blocks near the site of the building by collective or Socialist measures, than to adopt the comparatively foolish method of having the blocks made in London and shipped from here to the north of Scotland.

Mr. HARDIE: I want to protest. This is an Irishman's witty attempt to evade a question, but it will not work. The blocks made in Glasgow are made from the destructor clinker of the Glasgow
Corporation. If the right hon. Gentleman knew anything about the business he would know that.

PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE.

Mr. MONTAGUE: 40.
asked the Minister of Health whether he is prepared to appoint a court of inquiry to investigate and report upon the prevailing conditions of the public health service of the country?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I do not, as at present advised, see any necessity for such a general inquiry as is suggested, since there is clearly room for further expansion and improvement of the services on what is already known about them.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOSPITAL ACCOMMODATION.

Mr. AYLES: 42.
asked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been called to the insufficiency of hospital accommodation in this country and to the great amount of waste and inefficiency due to the overlapping of public and voluntary service; and whether he will institute an inquiry into the whole system of hospital and sanatorium accommodation with a view to the establishment of an adequate, economical and eff[...]eient service?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I do not think the time is opportune for the far-reaching inquiry suggested by my hon. Friend. I have already invited the Voluntary Hospitals Committee to investigate the question of the extent to which hospital accommodation may be inadequate.

Oral Answers to Questions — BOARDS OF GUARDIANS (PARENTAL POWERS).

Lieut.-Colonel WOODWARK: 43.
asked the Minister of Health whether he will consider the amendment of Section 1 (1) of the Poor Law Act, 1899, by substituting 21 years for 18 years as the limit of age of vesting of parental powers in the guardians where the guardians consider that, in the interests of the person with respect to whom a resolution of vesting is passed, the extension of the age limit is necessary or desirable?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the reply which I gave on the 21st May in answer to the hon. Member for Ipswich.

Oral Answers to Questions — POOR LAW INSTITUTIONS (INSURANCE BENEFITS).

Lieut.-Colonel WOODWARK: 44.
asked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the increasing numbers of persons being admitted into the guardians' institutions who are entitled to receive benefits under the National Health Insurance Act, he will consider amending the Act authorising the guardians to claim an equitable amount of benefits in order that the money can be appropriated towards the cost of the patients' maintenance?

Mr. W. A. JENKINS: 58
asked the Minister of Health if he is aware of the
increasing number of persons being admitted into Poor Law institutions who are entitled to receive benefits under the National Health Insurance Act; and will he take steps to get the Act amended to give authority to the boards of guardians to claim an equitable amount of benefits in order that the money can be appropriated towards the cost of the patient's maintenance?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I would refer the hon. Members to the reply which I gave, on 6th May, to a similar question by the hon. Member for Chelmsford.

Oral Answers to Questions — OIL.

Viscount WOLMER: 45.
asked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been drawn to an announcement to the effect that the Royal Dutch and the Standard, the two big oil trusts, have entered into an agreement for the division between them of the world's oil markets; will he state if the AngloPersian Oil Company is a party to this agreement; and, if so, what steps the Government propose to take to prevent such a monopoly raising the prices of all oil products against consumers?

The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. William Graham): The answers to the first two parts of the question are in the negative; and the last part does not therefore arise.

Viscount WOLMER: Can the hon. Member answer the last part of the question?

Mr. GRAHAM: The Noble Lord will see that that does not arise. The company to which the Noble Lord refers are not parties to the agreement.

Oral Answers to Questions — DONALD WIRELESS REPORT.

Mr. BAKER: 46.
asked the Prime Minister the Government's decision on the Donald Wireless Report?

Mr. HARTSHORN: I have been asked to reply, and would refer the hon. Member to the answer which I gave to the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne on the 21st instant, and of which I will send him a copy.

Mr. BAKER: Does that reply mean that a decision has not yet been reached and, if so, is there any reason why that reply cannot be given?

Mr. HARTSHORN: The effect of the reply was that I am not yet in a position to make a statement.

Oral Answers to Questions — LIQUOR TRAFFIC, UNITED STATES.

Mr. NICHOL: 47.
asked the Prime Minister if he is aware of the widespread advertisements of Lieut.-Colonel Sir Brodrick Hartwell, baronet, soliciting financial support of schemes for the smuggling of large quantities of whisky into the United States of America; and if he will take powers to prevent this breach of the laws of a friendly State, in view of its effect on the relations between Great Britain and the United States?

The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. J. Ramsay MacDonald): I must refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave on Monday to the hon. and learned Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool.

Mr. NICHOL: Would it not be possible to deal with this open exploitation of military and other honours, and is there any method of withdrawing honours in cases where use of this kind is made of them?

Mr. T. JOHNSTON: Can the Prime Minister say whether this export business is still being subsidised to the extent of 3d. per gallon from public funds?

The PRIME MINISTER: With regard to the second supplementary question, I will make inquiries, but I expect that it is. I should like to assure the House that I would be only too glad to do anything to stop this sort of affair, and if hon. Members have any suggestions to make I should be very glad if they will let me have them.

Mr. WHITE: In view of the continuance of these activities by this person, will the Prime Minister consider the advisability of making either official or unofficial representations to the Underwriters' Association with regard to the prevention of the insuring of these cargoes?

The PRIME MINISTER: My attention was only drawn two days ago to the renewal of this outburst. It is at present under consideration.

Mr. NICHOL: Would it be possible to apply something of the well-known esprit de corps that we have in the Services to prevent this scandal?

Mr. LEIF JONES: Seeing that this traffic is carried on by the transhipment of spirit on the high seas, will the Prime Minister consider putting into force he Spirits Act, which says that spirits exempted from duty in this country must be delivered at the port to which they are consigned?

Viscountess ASTOR: Would it be possible to put a big export tax on this spirit?

Mr. FINNEY: Will the Prime Minister make inquiries whether the Assembly of the Island of Nassau is considering the project of reducing the import duty on spirits, in order to enable them to compete with the Island of St. Pierre in this traffic?

The PRIME MINISTER: Very few of the questions that have been put to me really belong to the Foreign Office. They are either Treasury questions or Colonial Office questions. I shall communicate with my colleagues and see whether we can do anything to remove this disgraceful blot.

Major COLFOX: Will the Prime Minister give a day for discussion of this matter?

Oral Answers to Questions — NAVAL STRENGTH (GREAT BRITAIN AND UNITED STATES).

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: 48.
asked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been drawn to the statement by Mr. Butler, Chairman of the Naval Committee to the House of Representatives of the United States of America, to the effect that at least $150,000,000 must be expended on the American Navy if it is to equal in strength His Majesty's Navy, including the building of eight fast cruisers at a cost of $15,000,000 each; and whether, in view of this statement, he will retard the building of the additional five cruisers for His Majesty's Navy until the possibility of a further conference on naval armaments has been explored?

The PRIME MINISTER: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. The United States proposal appeared on 2nd February. His Majesty's Government announced their intention to build the five cruisers on 21st February. With regard to the second part of the question, I have nothing to add to my replies to the hon. and gallant Member on 7th and 19th May.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is the Prime Minister aware that the right hon. Member for Bewdley (Mr. Baldwin) announced last November that we were going to build eight cruisers?

The PRIME MINISTER: That may be so, but as far as the question is concerned it refers to our five.

Mr. FERGUSON: What have we as an island to do with America?

Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: In point of fact, does not the Prime Minister admit that naval competition between these two Powers is proceeding?

The PRIME MINISTER: I do not think that is a fact. If I had any evidence that it was so, I should take steps at once to try to avoid it.

Captain BENN: Is it not a fact that Mr. Butler alleged the inferiority of the American Navy compared with the British Navy as the reason for this increase?

The PRIME MINISTER: I have heard such speeches delivered in this House, and so do not misunderstand speeches delivered in the House of Representatives.

Oral Answers to Questions — FOOD PRICES.

Sir KINGSLEY WOOD: 50.
asked the Prime Minister whether he is aware that Budget concessions are being neutralised by other articles being raised in price; and whether he proposes to take any action by way of legislation or otherwise in the matter?

Mr. COMPTON: 97.
asked the President of the Board of Trade ii his attention has been called to the serious increase in prices of non-dutiable commodities which take away from the consumer any advantage obtained through reduced Budget taxation; and what steps he proposes to take to remedy this state of affairs?

The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. A. V. Alexander): As I have previously stated, I have no reason to think that the rise which has recently taken place in the prices of certain articles of food is due to other than normal economic causes, but the situation is being carefully watched by the Government.

Sir K. WOOD: Is the hon. Gentleman not going to do something to deal with the position which has already arisen and is causing great hardship in many places up and down the country?

Oral Answers to Questions — JUBALAND.

Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURY: 51.
asked the Prime Minister whether he can state the terms on which he has arrived at a settlement with the Italian Government on the question of Jubaland?

The PRIME MINISTER: I have expressed my willingness immediately to conclude an agreement on the lines of an arrangement originally arrived at between Lord Milner and Signor Scialoja in March and April, 1920. Negotiations for the conclusion of a convention giving definite effect to this arrangement are shortly to he opened between the experts of the two Governments. Pending the result of these negotiations I cannot make a more detailed statement.

Lord STANLEY: Is any compensation to be paid to Kenya Colony for the probable loss of territory and revenue arising out of this concession?

The PRIME MINISTER: I understand that no representations have been made by Kenya on the subject.

Oral Answers to Questions — OLD AGE PENSIONS.

Captain BOWYER: 52.
asked the Prime Minister when he intends to bring in the Bill to amend the Old Age Pension Acts by removing the means limit?

The PRIME MINISTER: The Government's proposals for dealing with old age pensions are in an advanced stage and will be introduced as soon as possible, but I cannot yet actually name a day.

Captain BOWYER: Is the right hon. Gentleman going to do away with the means limit?

Oral Answers to Questions — RECRUITING (IRISH FREE STATE).

Sir W. DAVISON: 53.
asked the Prime Minister whether he is aware of the difficulties that are placed in the way of men and boys resident in Southern Ireland who desire to join the British Navy; whether his attention has been called to a circular recently issued by the director of naval recruiting in London stating that there are no facilities for recruiting in the Irish Free State, and that candidates must find their way to the nearest naval recruiting office, namely, either Bristol or Belfast, at their own expense, and be prepared to maintain themselves in England until all inquiries as to character, etc., have been made and answered (possibly a fortnight), and pay for the return journey should they be rejected; that the medical examination at Belfast is not final, and that candidates would be subjected to a further examination by a naval medical officer on arrival at the recruiting office in England; whether similar difficulties are placed in the way of men resident in South Ireland who desire to join the British Army; and whether he will take steps to remove these difficulties and to give facilities for men in Southern Ireland who desire to join the British Navy and Army?

Mr. AMMON: I have been asked to reply. I am afraid that such difficulties as exist are simply the result of distance. The circular referred to in the second part of the question is used in replying to individual applications received at the Admiralty. Men resident in the Irish Free State desirous of enlisting in the Army must present themselves at an Army recruiting office in North Ireland or Great Britain. As regards the last part of the question, naval and military recruiting stations are established in those districts which, being the centres of large populations, or for other reasons, are most likely to furnish a large number of suitable candidates. Residents in Southern Ireland are under no greater disability as regards naval recruiting than residents in distant parts of Great Britain.

Sir W. DAVISON: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that a large number of the most -gallant soldiers and sailors were in the past recruited from Southern Ireland, and does he not think it desirable that facilities should be given for these men, by arrangement with the Free State Gov-
ernment, who, I have no reason to doubt, would be willing to make such an arrangement?

Mr. AMMON: The Government are quite aware of what the hon. Member has said, and are willing to co-operate on the lines suggested, but owing to the small number of naval barracks, we must have these distances.

Mr. HEALY: Will the hon. Gentleman make representations in the proper quarter to see that soldiers in the Free State Army are not arrested in Northern Ireland when they are home on furlough?

Oral Answers to Questions — ADVERTISEMENT HOARDINGS.

Mr. WHITELEY: 56.
asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that the hoardings erected for the purpose of bill posting throughout the country are having a damaging effect on rateable values; and whether he will consider the advisability of bringing in a Bill to give power to the local authorities to place rateable values on hoardings, and to demand the removal of those that are deemed to be undesirable?

Mr. CHARLES EDWARDS: 86.
asked the Minister of Health whether he has received letters from local authorities asking that powers shall be conferred upon them to prevent the erection of hoardings without their consent; is he aware that many local authorities consider that these bill-posting hoardings have a damaging effect on the rateable values; and will he introduce a Bill giving such powers, and also powers to order the removal of those deemed to be undesirable?

Mr. WHEATLEY: I would refer my hon. Friends to the reply which I gave on Monday last in answer to a similar question by the hon. Member for South-East Essex.

Oral Answers to Questions — WIDOWS' AND CHILDREN'S PENSIONS.

Mr. W. A. JENKINS: 59.
asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that boards of guardians and the public generally urge that the immediate introduction of legislation to provide pensions for widows and children, in addition to fulfilling a moral obligation, would result in great social and economic advantages
to the community at large; and will he give this matter immediate consideration, and urge the Government to promote legislation to carry it into effect?

Mr. RAFFETY: 69.
asked the Minister of Health whether he has received a resolution from the board of guardians, Bath union, to the effect that pensions for widows and children, in addition to fulfilling a moral obligation, would result in great social and economic advantages to the community at large, and urging the Government to give the question their serious consideration and, if possible, promote legislation to carry this into effect; and when he proposes to introduce legislation for this purpose?

Mr. GRAHAM: I regret that I can add nothing to the statements made by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer during the Debate on this subject on the 20th February and in the course of his speech yesterday on the Second Reading of the Finance Bill. With regard to the first part of the question of the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Raffety), I understand that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health has received the resolution referred to.

Viscount WOLMER: Is it true that this matter is under the consideration of the Government?

Mr. GRAHAM: Yes; if the Noble Lord had heard the Chancellor's speech yesterday, he would have heard, not only that it was being considered, but that progress had been made, and it is hoped, without giving a pledge, to be able to overtake this before the end of the year.

Oral Answers to Questions — AIR DEATH RAY.

AIR SERVICE TESTS.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: (by Private Notice) asked the Under-Secretary of State for Air whether he can now make any statement relative to the invention known as the death ray?

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for AIR (Mr. Leach): The official statement issued to the Press yesterday contains the essential facts as regards the invention of the so-called death ray. Mr. Grindell Matthews was offered and refused an opportunity to demonstrate his invention under conditions which would satisfy either scientists or business
men. I wish to assure the House that every facility has been afforded to Mr. Grindell Matthews to give a demonstration under conditions satisfactory to himself and to the Services. The Departments have been placed in a difficult position in dealing with Mr. Grindell Matthews, partly because of the vigorous Press campaign which has been conducted on behalf of this gentleman and partly because this is not the first occasion on which this inventor has put forward schemes for which extravagant claims have been made. As a result, the Departments are unable to accept Mr. Grindell Matthews' statements in regard to this invention without a scrutiny which, apparently, he is not prepared to face.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Was this gentleman not paid £25,000 by the Admiralty for an invention to direct vessels by wireless, and were the Admiralty exactly throwing money away then?

Mr. LEACH: I cannot answer for another Department, but at any rate that took place before we accepted office.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Are the Government quite certain that there is no value in this invention, and, if so, are they taking any steps to prevent it going into other hands outside this country?

Mr. LEACH: We are not in a position to pass judgment on the value of this ray, because we have not been allowed to make proper tests of it. Therefore, whether there is anything in it or not is a matter which remains unexplored.

Commander BELLAIRS: Are there not several other claimants to an invention of a similar description? Why is this particular investigation being confined to the Air Ministry and not to the other fighting Services, since they have much greater experience in dealing with these matters?

Mr. W. THORNE: If there is any substance in this invention, how is it that, according to the newspapers, some steps have been taken to prevent this individual selling this particular invention to France?

Viscount CURZON: Is it not a fact that we have in use in the Air Force to-day an invention which will do all that Mr. Grindell Matthews was able to do in the course of his experiments the other day?

Mr. LEACH: In reply to the last question, every phenomenon produced by Mr. Grindell Matthews at this trial can readily be reproduced by the people in our Department, but that does not say there is anything of value in the phenomenon. In reply to the other question, all three Departments were joined in the investigation conducted at the laboratory of Mr. Grindell Matthews, and their opinion was unanimous on the matter. I cannot, of course, say much in favour of the romantic-minded public, which is inclined to take too much notice of a Press campaign, because that phenomenon is too frequent.

Mr. T. JOHNSTON: Having regard to the extraordinary sums of public money which had to be spent on an American firm to prevent them supplying foodstuffs to the Germans during the War, will the right hon. Gentleman undertake that no public money will be spent on any blackmailing individual who threatens otherwise to sell his invention to a foreign power?

Lieut.-Colonel RUDKIN: May I ask if the interim injunction issued prior to the departure of the inventor abroad was issued at the instance of the Government?

Mr. LEACH: No, we had nothing to do with that matter at all.

Mr. PRINGLE: Will the right hon. Gentleman say what he means by the word "phenomenon"?

Lieut.-Colonel WATTS-MOR GAN: Would it be possible to introduce this invention to perform an operation on the Opposition?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.

Mr. BALDWIN: In regard to the Motion for the suspension of the Eleven o'Clock Rule, will the Deputy-Leader of the House state how far it is proposed to go?

The LORD PRIVY SEAL (Mr. Clynes): We are asking for the suspension, of the Eleven o'Clock Rule to-night solely to secure the disposal of the two Supply items on the Order Paper, namely, the Airship Service and the Scottish Fisheries.

Mr. MILLS: Will the right, hon. Gentleman, for the 'benefit of Members who are anxious about the Whitsuntide
holidays, give us any idea as to whether
the "death ray" is to be perpetrated to-morrow night?

Ordered,
That the Proceedings of the Committee of Supply be exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sittings of the House)."—[Mr. Clynes.]

ROADSIDE PETROL PUMPS.

Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURY: I beg to move
That leave be given to introduce a Bill to provide for the licensing of petrol pumps by highway authorities.
The object of this Bill is to enable highway authorities to permit of the erection of petrol supply pumps on the edge of the roadway. This has already been done in the case of lamp-posts, electric standards, water-cart stand pipes and other installations, but the present position in regard to petrol pumps is most unsatisfactory. No local authority and no body or person is vested with the power to approve or disapprove of the installation of petrol pumps. Local authorities have no power to acquiesce in the erection of such installations on lands which are part of the public highway, and any person erecting such pump and even the local authority itself would be liable to an action for damages in the event of any injury being caused to a person or to a person's business by obstruction. So great is the convenience of these installations to all classes of motor users that many local authorities, in spite of the illegality, have allowed the erection of these kerb-side pumps. Manchester, Bristol, Nottingham, Northampton, Swansea and many other large centres have permitted them to be set up, and this Bill is founded on the recommendation of a Select Committee of the House of Lords which dealt with the Petroleum Bill last July. That recommendation is as follows:
Power should be given by a general Act, enabling local authorities to license at their discretion roadside pumps of a type approved by the central authority for the supply of motor spirit to vehicles.
In giving evidence before that Committee, Sir John Anderson, the Permanent Secretary to the Home Office, said he had no objection whatever to such pumps,
as far as public safety was concerned, if they were under some sort of control. The Chief Inspector of Explosives under the Home Office urged before the same Committee that, even on the kerb, these pumps might be encouraged and licensed. This Bill is supported by nearly all the motoring associations in the country, by the Automobile Society, the Motor Trade Association, the Scottish Motor Trade Association, the Auto-Cycle Union, and many others. I understand the only reason for any objection is the idea of obstruction. Let Me point out that a standard only occupies space of 15 inches square, and four cars can be filled at one of these pumps in the same time that it took to fill one car by the antiquated system of bringing cans of petrol out from a garage. It only takes eight seconds per gallon in the case of the one-gallon pump to put petrol into the car, and in the case of the five-gallon pump it only takes four seconds per gallon. In that way obstruction will be lessened by the use of the pumps. The Bill is a simple one. The first Clause gives the highway authority power to license, and where the highway authority is not the local government authority, permission has to be obtained from the local government authority.
Supposing that owing to a change of routes there should be congestion in a particular road, the local authority has power to take away the permit, and anyone who considers hmiself aggrieved has power to appeal to the Ministry of Transport. The highway authority may charge a fee up to £1 and every pump and pipe licensed by the highway authority shall be so designed and constructed as to comply with the safeguards against fire and explosion prescribed by the Home Secretary, and shall be approved by the Board of Trade. Any person not complying with these Regulations will be liable to a penalty not exceeding £5. Many authorities in view of the prospect of legislation, though knowing the illegality of their proceedings up to now, have not ordered these pumps to be dismantled. Manchester, Monmouth, Chichester, and other big towns have been holding on, knowing that some legislation must be brought in in order to legalise these pumps which to-day are becoming a necessity. This is only a small Bill and it is not contentious. We have to look forward to the future.
Motor-cars are going to increase every year, and the provision of these pumps will mean an avoidance of obstruction. It is in the interest of hundreds of thousands of motor users that these should be legalised, and I hope the House will look favourably on this Bill, which is only an attempt to put right a state of affairs at present most unsatisfactory to all parties concerned.

Colonel ASHLEY: I wish to say a few words on this proposal, and am afraid that I cannot see my way to agree with the ideas put forward by my hon. and gallant Friend. What is the history of this Measure? For the first time, last Session three corporations inserted in their private Bills a proposal that they should be allowed to legalise these pumps, and my noble Friend the Member for South Battersea (Viscount Curzon), on 3rd July, put a question to the then Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport on the subject, and the following official answer was given:
I am advised that local authorities have no power to sanction, or even to acquiesce in, the erection of petrol pumps or similar installations on lands dedicated to a public highway. It seems to me very desirable that petrol pumps should, wherever possible, be erected on private property adjacent to the highway, in such a manner as to enable vehicles to draw up to the pump without causing obstruction either in the carriageway or on the footpath. I am not prepared"—
The Parliamentary Secretary went on to say—
to support any Clauses in any private Bills intended to confer powers on local authorities to authorise such installations on lands dedicated to the public highway."—[OFFTMAL REPORT, 3rd July, 1923; cols. 235–6, Vol. 166.]
After that declaration, two out of the three corporations withdrew their suggested Clause, but one corporation persisted. It was then referred to the Local Legislation Committee of this House, who went very fully into the matter, and the Chairman, in communicating his decision to the promoters, said:
The decision of the Committee is that this power ought not to be granted. The feeling of the Committee is that an authority allowing these pumps to be erected without consent is neglecting its duty in not causing their removal, and if, in fact, it is allowing them to be erected with consent it is acting beyond its legal powers. The Clause must be struck out.
Last year, at any rate, both the appropriate Government Department who had charge of such petrol pumps and our Local Legislation Committee were not in agreement with the views expressed by my hon. and gallant Friend who sits behind me. Let the House consider for a moment the question of obstructions on the highway. They are increasing. We have already for public purposes pillar boxes, lamp posts, electric transformer pillars, telegraph and telephone posts, notices of omnibus stops, refuges for pedestrians, water troughs, sand bins, and many others. I do submit, in all seriousness that, unless for most cogent reasons, we ought not to increase these obstructions. From the point of view of street and road widening, which I am pleased to say is going on at an increasing rate, every obstruction adds considerably to the cost.
If we agree to allowing a private individual to put on a highway something on which he is going to make a profit, we cannot confine it only to petrol pumps. Obviously and logically, we should have to allow water pumps for steam vehicles, standards for feeding oil-tank wagons, and last, but not least, standards for supplying beer in bulk. I am not imagining that Last year, a local authority had an appli-

cation made by an enterprising publican to provide beer in bulk by means of a pump. It opens up a great vista of further obstructions on the highway. In my opinion, the right and proper way of providing for the needs of motorists is for the private trader to erect his pump on his own private land adjacent to the highway with a proper draw-off, or to erect the pump on his own premises. You see up and down the country many of these pumps erected on private land adjacent to the highway. There is a fine installation just the other side of Westminster Bridge. In my opinion, it is on those lines that you ought to proceed to provide for the public need. This is a matter of principle. It is a claim by a private individual to make use of the highway by means of an obstruction for personal profit. That seems to me to be entirely wrong. The public highway has been constructed and is being maintained by public money. If you once admit the principle that a private individual may obstruct the public highway for his own personal profit, you will have no end to such demands.

Question put, "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for the licensing of petrol pumps by highway authorities."

The House divided: Ayes, 208; Noes, 112.

Division No. 85.]
AYES.
[4.8 p.m.


Adamson, W. M. (Staff., Cannock)
Clynes, Rt. Hon. John R.
Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Coine)


Allen, R. Wilberforce (Leicester, S.)
Cockerill, Brigadler-General G. K.
Greenwood, William (Stockport)


Alstead, R.
Cohen, Major J. Brunel
Grenfell, D. R. (Glamorgan)


Amery, Rt. Hon. Leopold C. M. S.
Compton, Joseph
Groves, T.


Astor, Viscountess
Cope, Major William
Guest, Dr. L. Haden (Southwark, N.)


Baird, Major Rt. Hon. Sir John L.
Costello, L. W. J.
Hacking, Captain Douglas H.


Barclay, R. Noton
Cowan, D. M. (Scottish Universities)
Hall, F. (York, W. R., Normanton)


Barnett, Major Richard W.
Crittall, V. G.
Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)


Barrie, Sir Charles Coupar (Banff)
Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)
Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry


Beilairs, Commander Carlyon W.
Davies, Ellis (Denbigh, Denbigh)
Harbord, Arthur


Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymouth, Drake)
Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)
Harland, A.


Benn, Captain Wedgwood (Leith)
Davies, Sir Thomas (Cirencester)
Harris, John (Hackney, North)


Berkeley, Captain Reginald
Davison, Sir W. H. (Kensington, S.)
Harris, Percy A.


Birchall, Major J. Dearman
Dickie, Captain J. P.
Hartshorn, Rt. Hon. Vernon


Blundell, F. N.
Dixey, A. C.
Harvey, T. E. (Dewsbury)


Bonwick, A.
Dixon, Herbert
Hayday, Arthur


Bowyer, Capt. G. E. W.
Dodds, S. B.
Hayes, John Henry


Bramsdon, Sir Thomas
Dukes, C.
Healy, Cahir


Brass, Captain W.
Eden, Captain Anthony
Hemmerde, E. G.


Brassey, Sir Leonard
Ednam, Viscount
Henderson. A. (Cardiff, South)


Briant, Frank
Edwards, C. (Monmouth, Bedwelity)
Henderson, W. W.(Middlesex, Enfield)


Brittain, Sir Harry
Edwards, John H. (Accrington)
Henn, Sir Sydney H.


Broad, F. A.
Emlyn-Jones, J. E. (Dorset, N.)
Hennessy, Major J. R. G.


Brown, A. E. (Warwick, Rugby)
Falconer, J
Hindle, F.


Burman, J. B.
Ferguson, H.
Hobhouse, A. L.


Burney, Lieut.-Com. Charles D.
Fletcher, Lieut.-Com. H. T. H.
Hogbin, Henry Cairns


Burnie, Major J. (Bootle)
Foot, Isaac
Hogge, James Myles


Caine, Gordon Hall
Franklin, L. B.
Hood, Sir Joseph


Cape, Thomas
Frece, Sir Walter de
Hore-Belisha, Major Leslie


Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton
Gavan-Duffy, Thomas
Isaacs, G. A.


Chapman, Sir S.
George, Major G. L. (Pembroke)
James, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. Cuthbert


Clarry, Reginald George
Gibbins, Joseph
Jenkins, W. A. (Brecon and Radnor)


Clayton, G. C.
Gibbs, Cat. Rt. Hon. George Abraham
Jephcott, A. R.


Clusc, W. S.
Gould, Frederick (Somerset, Frome)
Jewson, Dorothea


John, William (Rhondda, West)
Perkins, Colonel E. K.
Spero, Dr. G. E.


Johnstone, Harcourt (Willesden, East)
Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.
Spoor, B. G.


Jones, C. Sydney (Liverpool, W. Derby)
Phillipps, Vivian
Stanley, Lord


Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)
Pilkington, R. R.
Stephen, Campbell


Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton
Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)


Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)
Pringle, W. M. R.
Stewart, Maj. R. S.(Stockton-on-Tees)


Jowett, Rt. Hon. F. W. (Bradford, E.)
Raffan, P. W.
Stranger, Innes Harold


Kay, Sir R. Newbald
Raffety, F. W.
Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray Fraser


Keens, T.
Raine, W.
Sunlight, J.


Kennedy, T.
Rawson, Alfred Cooper
Sutherland, Rt. Hon. Sir William


Kenworthy, Lt. Com. Hon. Joseph M.
Rea, W. Russell
Thompson, Piers G. (Torquay)


Kenyon, Barnet
Rees, Capt. J. T. (Devon, Barnstaple)
Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton, E.)


King, Captain Henry Dcu[...]las
Remnant, Sir James
Thornton, Maxwell R.


Lambert, Rt. Hon. George
Rentoul, G. S.
Toole, J.


Lansbury, George
Richardson, Lt.-Col. Sir P. (Chertsey)
Turner, Ben


Lawrence, Susan (East Ham, North)
Ritson, J.
Vaughan-Morgan, Col. K. P.


Leach, W.
Robertson, T. A.
Wallhead, Richard C.


Linflerd, F. C.
Robinson, S. W. (Essex, Cheimsford)
Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen


Lloyd-Greame, Rt. Hon. Sir Philip
Romeril, H. G.
Ward, Lt.-Col. A.L.(Kingston-on-Hull)


Lowe, Sir Francis William
Royce, William Stapleton
Warrender, Sir Victor


Lumley, L. R.
Royle, C.
Watson, Sir F. (Pudsey and Otiey)


Lynn, Sir R. J.
Rudkin, Lieut.-Colonel C. M. G.
Watts-Morgan, Lt.-Col. D. (Rhondda)


McCrae, Sir George
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)
Webb, Rt. Hon. Sidney


Macpherson, Rt. Hon. James I.
Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)
Weston, John Wakefield


Maden, H.
Samuel, H. Walter (Swansea, West)
Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.


Mansel, Sir Courtenay
Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.
White, H. G. (Birkenhead, E.)


March, S.
Savery, S. S.
Williams, A. (York, W.R., Sowerby)


Marks, Sir George Croydon
Scrymgeour, E.
Williams, David (Swansea, E.)


Martin, F. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dlne, E.)
Scurr, John
Williams, Col. P. (Middlesbrough, E.)


Masterman, Rt. Hon. C. F. G.
Seely, H. M. (Norfolk, Eastern)
Williams, Maj. A.S.(Kent, Sevenoaks)


Millar, J. D.
Seely,Rt.Hn.Maj.-Gen.J.E.B.(I.of W.)
Wilson, Sir Charles H. (Leeds, Central)


Milne, J. S. Wardlaw
Sexton, James
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Morris, R. H.
Shaw, Rt. Hon. Thomas (Preston)
Wintringham, Margaret


Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, North)
Sheffield, Sir Berkeley
Wise, Sir Fredric


Morrison Bell, Major Sir A. C. (Honlton)
Shepperson, E. W.
Wolmer, Viscount


Naylor, T. E.
Short, Alfred (Wednesday)
Wood, Major Rt. Hon. Edward F. L.


Newton, Sir D. G. C. (Cambridge)
Simon, E. D.(Manchester, Withington)
Wood, Major M. M. (Aberdeen, C.)


Nixon, H.
Simpson, J. Hope
Woodwark, Lieut.-Colonel G. G.


O'Grady, Captain James
Sitch, Charles H.
Yerburgh, Major Robert D. T.


O'Neill, John Joseph
Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)



Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William
Smith, W. R. (Norwich)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:—


Owen, Major G.
Spears, Brig.-Gen. E. L.
Lieut.-Colonel Howard-Bury and


Parry, Thomas Henry
Spencer, George A. (Broxtowe)
Captain Viscount Curzon.


Penny, Frederick George




NOES.


Acland, Rt. Hon. Francis Dyke
Hardie, George D.
Parkinson, John Allen (Wlgan)


Adamson, Rt. Hon. William
Harmsworth, Hon. E. C. (Kent)
Perry, S. F.


Alexander, A. V. (Sheffield, Hillsbro')
Harvey,C.M.B.(Aberd'n & Kincardne)
Potts, John S.


Ammon, Charles George
Haycock, A. W.
Raynes, W. R.


Attlee, Major Clement R.
Henderson, T. (Glasgow)
Richards, R.


Ayles, W. H.
Hirst, G. H.
Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)


Banton, G.
Hodges, Frank
Roundell, Colonel R. F.


Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)
Hoffman, P. C.
Shinwell, Emanuel


Barnes, A.
Horne, Sir R. S. (Glasgow, Hillhead)
Smillie, Robert


Barnston, Major Sir Harry
Howard, Hn. D.(Cumberland, Northn)
Smith-Carington, Neville W.


Batey, Joseph
Hudson, J. H.
Snell, Harry


Beckett, Sir Gervase
Jackson, R. F. (Ipswich)
Spence, R.


Berry, Sir George
Johnston, Thomas (Stirling)
Steel, Samuel Strang


Bondfield, Margaret
Kirkwood, D.
Stuart, Hon. J. (Moray and Nairn)


Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.
Lamb, J. Q.
Sutton, J. E.


Briscoe, Captain Richard George
Law, A.
Thomson, Sir W.Mitchell- (Croydon,S.)


Buckle, J.
Lee, F.
Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)


Butler, Sir Geoffrey
Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)
Thurtie, E.


Cautley, Sir Henry S.
Lowth, T.
Tinker, John Joseph


Cayzer, Maj. Sir Herbt. R. (Prtsmth.S.)
Lunn, William
Tout, W. J.


Clarke, A.
Maclean, Neil (Glasgow, Govan)
Turton, Edmund Russborough


Cobb, Sir Cyril
Makins, Brigadier-General E.
Viant, S. P.


Colfox, Major Wm. Phillips
Marriott, Sir J. A. R.
Vivian, H.


Cove, W. G.
Maxton, James
Waddington, R.


Cowan, Sir Wm. Henry (Islington, N.)
Mills, J. E.
Ward, Col. J. (Stoke upon Trent)


Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry
Moore-Brabazon, Lieut.-Col. J. T. C
Warne, G. H.


Dickson, T.
Morden, Coionel Walter Grant
Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)


Duncan, C.
Morel, E. D.
Weir, L. M.


Edwards, G. (Norfolk, Southern)
Mosley, Oswald
Wells, S. R.


Egan, W. H.
Muir, John W.
Whiteley, W.


Elveden, Viscount
Murray, Robert
Wignall, James


England, Colonel A.
Nail, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Joseph
Wilson, Colonel M. J. (Richmond)


Eyres-Monsell, Com. Rt. Hon. B. M.
Newman, Sir R. H. S. D. L. (Exeter)
Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)


FitzRoy, Capt. Rt. Hon. Edward A.
Nichol, Robert
Windsor, Walter


Gardner, B. W. (West Ham, Upton)
Nicholson, William G. (Petcrsfield)
Wright, W


Gilmour, Colonel Rt. Hon. Sir John
O'Connor, Thomas P.



Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Oliver, George Harold
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Grundy, T. W.
Palmer, E. T.
Colonel Ashley and Mr. Sullivan.


Gwynne, Rupert S.




Question put, and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Lieut.-Colonel Howard-Bury, Captain Viscount Curzon, Sir William Lane Mitchell, Lieut.-Colonel Pownall, Mr. Bonwick, Mr. John Harris, Mr. Linfield, Mr. Toole, Mr. Benjamin Smith, and Mr. Tillett.

ROADSIDE PETROL PUMPS BILL,

"to provide for the licensing of petrol pumps by highway authorities," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to be read a Second time Tomorrow, and to be printed. [Bill 146.]

ESTIMATES.

First Report from the Select Committee, with Minutes of Evidence and Appendices, brought up, and read;

Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

BILLS REPORTED.

Ministry of Health Provisional Orders (No. 5) Bill,

Reported, with an Amendment [Provisional Orders confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table.

Bill, as amended, to be considered To-morrow.

Ministry of Health Provisional Orders (Water) Bill,

Reported, with an Amendment [Provisional Orders confirmed]; Report to lie upon the Table,

Bill, as amended, to be considered To-morrow.

Ring's Lynn Docks and Railway Bill [Lords],

Reported, without Amendment; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

Malvern Hills Bill [Lords],

Reported, with Amendments; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

Rotherham Corporation Bill,

Reported, with Amendments, from the Local Legislation Committee (Section B); Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.

That they have passed a Bill, intituled, "An Act to make provision with respect to leave of absence from India of the
Governor-General, Commander-in-Chief, Governors and members of Executive Councils, and with respect to the appointment of Commander-in-Chief." [Government of India (Leave of Absence) Bill [Lords.]

STANDING ORDERS.

Resolutions reported from the Select Committee:

1. "That, in the case of the Birmingham Corporation Bill [Lords], Petition for additional Provision, the Standing Orders ought to he dispensed with:—That the parties be permitted to insert their additional Provision if the Committee on the Bill think fit."
2. "That, in the case of the Yorkshire Electric Power [Lords], Petition for Bill, the Standing Orders ought to be dispensed with:—That the parties he permitted to proceed with their Bill."
3. "That, in the case of the Bristol Water Bill [Lords], the Standing Orders ought not to be dispensed with."

Report to lie upon the Table.

SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES).

STANDING COMMITTEE B.

Mr. NICHOLSON reported from the Committee of Selection; That they had discharged the following Member from Standing Committee B: Mr. Penny.

STANDING COMMITTEE D.

Mr. William Nicholson further reported from the Committee: That they had discharged the following Members from Standing Committee D (added in respect of the Unemployment Insurance (No. 2) Bill): Sir William Joynson-Hicks, Mr. Annesley Somerville, and Mr. Luke Thompson: and had appointed in substitution: Captain Brass. Mr. Hall Caine, and Mr. Lloyd.

Reports to lie upon the Table.

ORDER OF THE DAY.

SUPPLY.

Considered in Committee.

[Mr. ENTWISTLE in the Chair.]

AIR SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATE, 1924–25.

TECHNICAL AND WARLIRE STORES (INCLUDING EXPERIMENTAL AND RESEARCH SERVICES).

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £350,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Expense of Technical and Warlike Stores of the Air Force (including Experimental and Research Services), which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1925.

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for MR (Mr. Leach): I think it would be as well if I state some of the reasons for the Vote which we are asking the Committee to accept to-day. The development of lighter-than-air methods of travel has lagged curiously behind the heavier-than-air methods, and aeroplane progress has been faster than the progress with ships. The experience of all countries in airship research has been full of disappointment, and our own has been unfortunate. After the War, when the general slump began, we practically abandoned all our work in this department under the stress of economy. The whole of our plant, buildings, ships and material were offered free to anybody who would undertake development work, but not a single offer was forthcoming. Efforts were made to enlist the Dominions in schemes with an Imperial basis, but they failed, as no one seemed able to afford the large expenditure necessary. It is true that in 1921 a conference of Prime Ministers, representative of the United Kingdom and of the Dominions, was interested in this matter. They went into deliberation on the subject and made the suggestion set forth in Command Paper 1474, that
for the present the development of Imperial air communications to India, Africa, Australia and New Zealand must be by direct Government action.
When a thing is desirable but offers no prospect of dividend the principle of State ownership has no opponents. For
three or more years we have done nothing in this matter. Our splendid up-to-date airship factory at Cardington has been closed. Our Research Department has certainly been at work making investigations and accumulating knowledge during that period.
Then came the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney). I am bound to say he has displayed during those years very considerable faith in the future of lighter-than-air travel. Backed by powerful interests, he made certain offers, and I am satisfied that, on the whole principle of lighter-than-air travel, we are under special obligations to him. Negotiations were entered into and took the shape of a three-stage proposal. The first stage involved building one airship with a cubic capacity of 5,000,000 cubic feet, and her successful navigation to India, in not more than seven days. The promoters were to find £200,000 and the Government £400,000, and the time estimated for the accomplishment of the first stage was from one to one and a-half years. The second stage involved the building of two more airships and a weekly service to India. It also involved the raising of an additional £150,000 by the promoters and a further Government contribution of £1,200,000. The period estimated for the second stage was put at three years. The third stage involved three more airships and a bi-weekly service to India, the provision of £150,000 more by private capitalists, while the Government were to find a further £1,200,000. The time for this was estimated at three years. Then, following on that, there was to be an annual fee for eight years by the Government of £250,000, or £41,666 on each ship, as a sort of retainer. In addition, all existing airships, five in number, and materials, stores, etc., were to be handed over to the company as a gift. The original cost of these assets was well over £1,000,000, and estimating to-day's value at one-fifth of that amount, it means a gift to the company of £200,000. Cardington and Fulham are to be let to the promoters at a peppercorn rent. In 15 years this would be equivalent to a capital contribution of not less than £500,000. Thus the promoters were putting up £500,000 while the Government were putting up £5,500,000 in cash and in other ways. That looks sufficiently one-
sided, but other provisions make it still more so. The £200,000 worth of ships, material and stores is a gift. It is wiped off State assets like a bad debt. £500,000 worth of rent for Cardington and Fulham is also a gift. The eight instalments of £250,000, or £2,000,000, to be paid over by the Government as retaining fees, go into the coffers of the company.
What were we to get for that? A lien on the ships in case of war. The fee payments strike me as remarkably generous. Then there is a further provision for the subsidy payments. £2,800,000 are to be guaranteed by the creation of non-interest bearing debentures, and no assets are made to cover that period. For a period of seven years the promoters are in this way to be in receipt of a further subsidy of about £140,000 per annum. A commercial company able to borrow £2,800,000 free of interest would surely regard itself as on velvet.
Curiously there was a division by the promoters of their activities into two companies—one to be styled a guarantee company and the other an operating company. The guarantee company was to do the financing and probably to construct the airship. The other company was to operate the ships when built. The guarantee company was not to have more than 10 per cent. profit on the construction work involved, but on the other hand it could make unlimited profit on any orders which it might receive from all parts of the world. On its board the Government were not to be represented. The operating company, which was to work the actual service, was to have two Government directors, and out of its profits, after providing for reserves, one-half was to go to the repayment of the Government subsidies. Its initial capital was £200,000 while the capital of the guarantee company was £300,000. It is possible to envisage a position in which the guarantee company was doing very well, the operating company were making no profits, and in that case the repayment of the subsidies advanced by the Government could not be made. Any such repayments were only to come out of the profits of the operating company. Those of the guarantee company were not to be touched. There was a proviso also that at the end of the first year, if the scheme
did not look very promising—it had no chance of fruition—then the Government could cut its loss and clear out. The provision made for getting back the 2400,000 subsidy in that case seemed to me a little dubious, and I am very much afraid that it would under these circum-
stances have been lost. A similar provision was also made to apply at the end of the fourth year, if at that time it appeared that the scheme was not going to work, and again the Government had the right to cut their losses and clear out. That means that their loss would probably be the full sum advanced up to then, namely, £1,600,000.
It is obvious that these safety provisions were not very safe after all. If there was any promise left in the scheme at the end of the four years, the Government would have been bound to continue their support. However morally certain they might themselves feel that the plan was a dubious one, the impelling force of the need for developing airships and the fact that the Government had all their eggs in this one basket, would, I feel sure, have made it impossible to retreat. There was another defect in the scheme which strikes me as fatal, and that was the monopoly position granted to the promoters. Under this scheme they would be the sole manufacturers of airships in the British Isles, and in the circumstances of the case nobody would be able to compete with them. They would be in possession of the finest and largest and most up-to-date airship factory in the world. The Government had been asked to bind itself to grant no financial help to any other airship company, and whether they might or might not have agreed to that proviso, I think it is a moral certainty that it would have worked out as the promoters wished, and that no other subsidies could have been made, in view of the very large commitments of the Government under this one. Financed as I have described, the promoters proposed to build for any other nation that came along. The results of research conducted at the public expense would be thus purchasable by any foreign Power, no competition here would have had the remotest chance with them, and for 15 years their position would have been impregnable. Further, in the opinion of my technical advisers, the initial stages of this scheme had not been well thought out. A 5,000,000 cubic feet
airship is more than twice as large as any airship which has been built yet in this country. No provision was made
for a shed in India. Probably, it was the intention of the promoters to provide there a mooring mast on a monitor. The possibility of repairs being needed does not seem to have occurred to the promoters, and the fact that a shed would be necessary to make any effective repairs has not been part of their scheme.

Commander BELLAIRS: When the hon. Member says that, is he not talking of the experimental stage? Surely it would follow if successful?

Mr. LEACH: No other provision than the one I have indicated was named by the promoters at any stage. Under these circumstances the ship might very well get to India, and be unable to come back. Another point is this: If the Burney scheme had been adopted, the Government would have gained no first-hand technical experience in the construction, operation, and general development of airships. It would also have lost Cardington and Pulham, the only places from which at present research can be conducted. If airships are likely to have a serious use for naval, military and air force purposes generally, this presents us with rather a grave problem, and the House ought to consider that aspect of it. I suggest that the possibility of being in such a position could not have been entertained, and the wisdom of the Government in rejecting the proposal as it was originally made must now, I hope, be evident. For all these and other reasons, the Burney scheme was turned down. We should, however, have been very seriously lacking in our duty if we had not proposed anything in its place. In place of a scheme involving £4,800,000 commitments and other gratuities of at least £700,000, we have proposed the scheme outlined to the House a few days ago by the Prime Minister, and about which I do not need to go much more closely into the details, because they are set forth in his speech and in the details of the Supplementary Estimate in the White Paper.
But I would say this: The experience of every country shows the need for a good deal further research before an effective airship capable of travelling long distances can be regarded as a solved problem. We propose, therefore, to
begin that research and those experiments at Cardington, near Bedford. We shall first of all re-condition one of our existing ships for research purposes. We shall also at an early date proceed with the building of a new airship of 5,000,000 cubic feet capacity. This will revive by degrees the more or less moribund life of Cardington village, which is also our property. Inside a year we may have 400 people at work there, though I cannot, of course, guarantee that figure. That number will increase the year following, and I may say that it takes no account of the contractors' workpeople, who will be at work enlarging the shed, making mooring masts, etc. W e shall construct overseas the necessary intermediate and terminal bases to enable the two ships, one built by us and one built by contract, to fly with safety between here and India.

Captain BRASS: Can the hon. Gentleman say where that overseas base will be built?

Mr. LEACH: I would rather not, at the present moment.

Mr. WELLS: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us the cost of the station abroad?

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: You cannot keep a shed secret after it is built. I think it is an important part of the scheme, and there is no reason why we should not be told where it is to be.

Mr. LEACH: The reason why I do not think it wise to discuss the site of the intermediate base is because we have not yet negotiated with the people who have to sell it. We have to pay some regard to wishes of Governments whose territory we shall be occupying in this way. The promised White Paper has been issued, giving the outlines of the proposed contract under which the second ship is to be built. That contract, I understand, is ready for signature as soon as the House agrees to let it go through. The time limit for the various stages of its fulfilment is three years, but I am told the prospective contractors are not of opinion that that length of time will be necessary. The total cost is £350,000. Our own costs will be much larger. We have to provide, as I have mentioned, these costly overseas bases, we have to recondition an existing ship, we have to furnish proper repair departments over-
seas, and we have, in effect, to make a highway to India.

Mr. WALLHEAD: Will the hon. Gentleman tell us the cost of a hangar or shed?

Mr. LEACH: Perhaps I will try to deal with these matters later on. The whole scheme involves a three years' programme, a gross expenditure of £1,350,000, or, allowing for the re-purchase of the contractors' airship by them, £1,200,000. As set forth in the Estimates, of that total we are asking this year for £350,000. The question of technical staff and of expert research workers has been fully explored, and we are satisfied that in that respect we are properly and fully equipped. My Department may be said to be straining at the leash, in expectation of the word "go." We have faith in the outcome of this experiment. We look for a successful achievement, opening up a new era of Dominion relationship, because the communication with our blood relations overseas will be put upon a closer basis than it has ever be-en put before. It is certain that the Dominion aspect of the scheme, about which I have said so little, is nevertheless a very bright and alluring part of it, and the prospect of reaching India in five days, followed by that of reaching Australia in from ten to twelve days, is surely sufficient to take a few risks. In regard to our commerce, if this development prove successful, as I am confident it may, there are tremendous possibilities ahead, and it is therefore with a great deal of confidence that I ask the House to-day to give its support to this scheme.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: How long a period is expected to elapse -before we have the first ship able to make the first voyage to India?

Mr. LEACH: The outside period is three years, but I am pretty confident that it will be less.

Captain BRASS: How long a time will elapse before the hon. Member will be able to announce the place where he is going to have an intermediate station?

Mr. LEACH: That I cannot say, but I will communicate the information to the House as soon as it is possible to do so.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir SAMUEL HOARE: I am sure the Committee has listened with interest to the speech of the Under-Secretary of State for Air, and, at any rate on this side, we have noticed the progress that the hon. Gentleman has made and that has brought him to-day into this atmosphere of full blooded Imperialism. I cannot help hoping that the Under Secretary and his colleagues will take as great an interest in carrying out the other objects of the Imperial Conference, in which the members of the Conference were just as much interested as they are in this question of airships. There is another point that may not have struck hon. Members, as it struck me during the hon. Gentleman's speech. The hon. Member, as we noticed, has made great progress during his speeches in other fields of air policy. If we compare his first speech with his speech on the Estimates, and again his speech to-day, we see a very remarkable progress.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Not progress!

Sir S. HOARE: And to-day he comes before us, not only as a full-blooded Imperialist, but as a full-blooded militarist as well. He is going to do what I never should have ventured to do. He is coming to this Committee and asking hon. Members to agree to the building of a military airship by direct labour for the Government—a military airship to be built for the objects, as the Noble Lord described in another place, of the Air Ministry and the Admiralty. I never took any such militarist view of the immediate development of airships. I took the view, rather, that if airships have a future, that future lies in the field of commerce, and not in the construction of military airships that were abandoned at the end of the War, and until the Socialist Government came here, with the hon. Member as their spokesman, no one had any idea of reverting to it. Our scheme was a commercial scheme. Commerce was its foundation, and we had no intention of reverting to the building of military airships by direct labour under the Air Ministry, the Admiralty, or any other Department. And let the Committee notice, that while the Government have accepted every other part of the air policy of the late Government—their expansion scheme, the policy that they had adopted with reference to research,
the encouragment of light aeroplanes, and the policy with reference to starting an Auxiliary Air Force—their sole original contribution to the field of development of British aviation is the building of a military airship that the late militarist Conservative Government would never have dreamt of proposing to this House.
Let me come to a comparison between the scheme of the late Government and the scheme the outlines of which we have heard this afternoon. The Under-Secretary of State gave what, I suppose, he considered to be an accurate account of our scheme. He will forgive me for saying that I failed to recognise in the description that he gave, the description of the scheme to which we agreed last year, and which we should have embodied in a Bill, and brought before the House if we had still remained in office. Let me remind hon. Members what the scheme really was. It was, as say, a scheme based upon the fact that in our view the development of airships should be upon commercial lines, and with that basic fact in our minds we were prepared to make a loan without interest. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear !"] There is nothing of which to be ashamed in that. In any pioneer work of this kind, it will be found necessary, and the hon. Gentleman, if he remains in office long enough to see his own scheme developed, will find at the end of the three years of this experimental period, he will be faced with exactly the same problem with which we were faced. We were prepared to make a loan at the rate of £400,000 a year for seven years, to be repayable out of subsequent profits. It was not a free gift; it was a loan secured upon the assets of the company. [An HON. MEMBER: "If any!"] I do not think there is any cause of disagreement upon that point. Obviously, any company operating a, scheme of that kind for several years would have considerable assets at the end.
Anyhow, it was to be secured upon such assets as there were, and it was to be repayable out of subsequent profits, the company receiving half the profits and the State receiving the other half. AL the end of the seven years' period during which these loans were to run, we hoped that there would have been six large airships actually working upon a commercial ser-
vice between England and India, and we were then prepared to follow the precedent that was adopted some years ago—and still, so far as I know, exists—of making a payment by results. Just as we make a payment—so far as I know, it still exists—to the Cunard Company for keeping in commission a certain number of fast trans-Atlantic liners, so we were prepared to make a fee payment for each airship actually running upon this commercial service, and supposing six airships had been regularly engaged upon it, we were prepared to make fee payments, as I say, upon actual results, to the extent of £250,000 a year for a subsequent. period of eight years. The scheme being, as I say, a commercial scheme, we were anxious that it should develop upon commercial lines, and that it should receive as little interference as possible from Government intervention. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear!"] I suppose that the interjections of hon. Members opposite imply that we were delivering ourselves into the hands of a commercial company, and that we were not taking adequate safeguards in the interest of the State. An hon. Member opposite says, "It looks like it, anyway." If that be his view, let me point out to him the safeguards we actually took. The first safeguard was to insist that, as a guarantee of the stability and the good faith of the company, a substantial sum of private money should be subscribed to the enterprise, and we insisted that during the course of the three stages a sum of £500,000 should be subscribed by private, investors.
That was not only essential from the, point of view of safeguard of the stability of the company, but it was also valuable from another point of view, for it seemed to us that the best stimulus to a company to develop its airships efficiently and quickly was to make it certain that that money would be lost if the company did not carry on its business successfully, and that the better it did its work, the sooner there would be a return upon that private capital. We regarded, then, this subscription of private capital as not only evidence of the stability of the company with which we were dealing, but as one of the principal incentives to make the company develop, and to make it develop. quickly and efficiently. But there was a further safeguard, and it may be that
hon. Members will think it even more important than that to which I have just alluded. We were only going to pay by results. The scheme was divided into three stages. There was to be no payment for the second stage until the tests of the first stage had been actually carried out. Just in the same way there was to be no payment for the third stage until the tests of the second stage had also been adequately carried out. That meant that the liability was strictly limited to the actual payments by results, and it is, therefore, altogether incorrect to compare, as the Prime Minister compared the other clay, and as the Under-Secretary of State compared to-day, the figure of £4,800,000 with the figure of £1,350,000 in his Estimate. The only commitment that we were prepared to ask the country to enter into was a commitment of £400,000, with no further payment of any kind whatever until the tests in the various stages had been carried out.
5.0 P.M.
So much for the two principal safeguards. But there was another consideration that we had to keep in mind, and that was the consideration of safety. There, again, to judge by the speeches of the representatives of the Government, we would appear to have ignored that consideration altogether. Nothing of the kind was the case. The tests for the airships would have been as stringent and severe as the tests for airworthiness of aeroplanes. In both cases the Air Ministry would have been responsible for the airworthiness tests. I claim in all those three respects our scheme was amply safeguarded, and those safeguards make it very different from the travesty of the scheme that, the Under-Secretary has just described. He said it was a monopoly. It was nothing of the kind. It was a series of loans and payments to a particular company to carry out a particular service. There was nothing that prevented us from making similar payments to other companies. I should have hoped, if this pioneer work had succeeded, that by the end of the seven years period a number of other companies would have come
forward. We never intended that there should be a monopoly. Our scheme was not in the nature of a monopoly. Had it succeeded, there would have been, I feel sure, a
large amount of competition, perhaps on this line, and certainly on the other air lines which undoubtedly would have developed. It was not an unsafe scheme. The Under-Secretary said a little while ago that the experts of the Air Ministry criticised it on the ground of safety. I can tell the Committee that so long as I was Secretary of State for Air there was not any criti2ism made against it, as far as I know, by any expert at the Air Ministry. The question was considered not only at the Air Ministry, but by the experts of the Admiralty, and also by the Committee of Imperial Defence. So far as I can remember, there was a unanimous opinion expressed that technically there was no reason why the scheme associated with the name of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney) was not only technically feasible, but safe as well. The Under-Secretary shakes his head. I would ask him to remind me of any opinion expressed in opposition to this scheme during my term of office, on the ground that it was either technically impracticable or unsafe.

Mr. STEPHEN: The reports would be confidential

Sir S. HOARE: If the experts held that view, they never expressed it to the Minister in charge of the Department. If the scheme had failed, as I have just said, the country's commitments were strictly limited to the three periods. We should have cut our losses at any of the three, periods after the expenditure of the first £400,000, and if the scheme had succeeded, compared with the result—the meagre result—described in the Government White Paper, there would be a minimum of six airships running on a commercial service between India and this country. Compare the meagre result of these two experimental airships described in the White Paper, with the six airships running between India and England upon commercial lines. I emphasise those words "upon commercial lines."

Mr. JOHNSTON: Will the right hon. and gallant Gentleman tell us if it is not the case that the British Government had—it was an essential part of the scheme—to hand over these airship sheds and valuable properties in land for a peppercorn rent?

Sir S. HOARE: Yes. We should have had to hand over the airship material for a peppercorn rent. I do not see any objection to that. Up to that time these two great air stations at Gardington and Puiham were lying derelict—

Mr. JOHNSTON: They were assets?

Sir S. HOARE: —and the material in the sheds, I know, was, from a commercial point of view, absolutely worthless. There was a clause in the agreement under which the company was to pay £500,000 for the two properties. I challenge the hon. Gentleman or anyone else to get anyone to bid anything like that sum for those two air stations.
We were making an experiment with the definite object of proving whether airships were or were not a practical commercial proposition. We were going to test that problem in the only way [...] which you could test it—by having a genuine commercial experiment. It was not the case of seeing whether airships could fly. Airships have been flying for 20 years and more. It was a question of seeing whether airships were going to appeal to passengers, and were going to appeal to manufacturers and get freights, That was an experiment upon which we were engaged. The question was one of seeing whether airships would attract passengers; that, if they were started, whether passengers would travel upon them, and people would wish to send letters and freight, and what use they were going to make of them. In an experiment of that kind it was essential to have a number of airships actually in operation. It is no commercial experiment to have one airship making a single journey. A commercial experiment is an experiment with a regular service between England and India, carrying passengers and freight. I would ask hon. Members to compare these two schemes with those facts in mind. If hon. Members accept my first proposition that the future of airships is commercial, is the experiment the Government are now making an experiment that is really going to prove that at all? Was not the experiment that we were prepared to make, namely, six airships in a regular service between India and Britain, the only commercial test that could reasonably be applied to the problem?
Let me come to one or two other features of the Government scheme. £1,350,000 is to be spent during a period of three years. All this money is expended without any possibility of return, unlike the £400,000 which we were prepared to subscribe, as I have stated, and which was alone repayable out of subsequent profits.

Mr. JOHNSTON: Yes, of over 10 per cent.

Sir S. HOARE: No, no, that was altered, and the division of profits was between the Government and the airship company. That in itself appears to me to show that the Government scheme is likely to be more expensive than ours. There are other considerations. The private company has only the opportunity of building one of these two ships, and is to be paid £300,000 if it is asked, with the option afterwards of buying the ship, if it has built it, at £150,000. The Committee will note that in that transaction there is no incentive applied to the private company such as we should have been able to apply if our scheme had gone through, by means of the fact that a large sum of private capital had been put into the scheme, and it was, therefore, an advantage to the company to build airships for a commercial service no cheaply and efficiently as possible. In this proposal, there is no incentive of that kind at all. More serious still, in so far as I can see, no ultimate policy is in the mind of the Government as to what is going to happen at the end of this three years' period.
Our programme was based, not on what was going to happen in the next 18 months, or even in the next year or two, but on what was going to happen in seven years' time, and in 15 years' time. It was based on the ultimate policy of getting the service of six ships actually running commercially between this country and the Far East. In the case of the Government scheme there is no ultimate object in view at all, so far as one can see. They are simply building these two ships, and at the end of the three years they will be little further forward, and will be, faced with the problems at the end which we were ready to face at the very beginning. Again, the Government scheme seems to me to suggest that there is no possibility of economic construction. You are going to have two
separate bodies of people each building one airship. Surely, the only economic way to construct airships, as to construct anything else, is not by building one isolated machine, but by having a policy that will lead to repetition, and by putting down your plant, not for a single machine, but for a number of other machines in the future; by that means the scheme of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Uxbridge was during this period going to produce airships much more cheaply than possibly can be produced by the construction of one single airship either by the Air Ministry or by a private company.
There is one very serious objection to the policy of the hon. Gentleman the Under-Secretary. Here you are going to set up in the Air Ministry a great new airship department. At the present moment, so far as I know, there are in the Air Ministry very few officials who know anything about airships. You have therefore got to recreate a great airship department and set up a big Government organisation for the building of a single airship. Not only are you going to have a great department in the Air Ministry, but you are going to have two special boards set up on which will be represented seven or eight Government authorities. So far as I can understand, you are going to have a special investigation by a Committee of Imperial Defence into the relations existing between the Admiralty and the Air Ministry. You are having all this gigantic organisation for the building of a single airship. You are not only having this gigantic organisation in Whitehall, but you are going to have what appears to me to be no less dangerous, that is, a new construction organisation at Carding-ton. I took the view as long as I was Secretary of State for Air that it was altogether unwise for the Government to embark upon a policy either of aeroplane or airship construction, because it seemed to me that there was every kind of reason economical, political and aeronautical against it, and it therefore came about that no aeroplane construction was undertaken by the Government at the Royal aircraft establishment at Farnham.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite are now adopting their more Socialistic policy, and they are starting at Cardington new organisation for the direct construction of airships. There I disagree
entirely with the policy of the hon. Gentleman opposite, but, supposing I was wrong upon political grounds, let them consider for a moment how this proposition is going to work out economically. The attention of the Committee has been drawn to the fact that the construction of this airship at Cardington was going to employ 400 men and women. I should like to ask, in passing, whether these 400 men and women would not have been equally usefully employed if the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge had been commissioned to build two airships instead of one?
I want to know shat is going to happen to these 400 men and women when this single Government airship is finished? The essence of the proposal of the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge was that it was going to develop into a much greater Service during a period of 15 years. Before this Debate ends I should like the Under-Secretary of State for Air to tell the Committee what the Government really intend to do when this experimental period is over. What is going to happen to these 400 men and women? Have the Government mapped out an ultimate policy beyond that time? Do they contemplate the operation by the Government of a commercial service? All these questions are very relevant to this discussion, and so far we have not heard a word about them in the speech of the Under-Secretary.
Let me go back now to what I was saying about the Air Ministry. I say that it is very unwise to set up this new Department on a big scale at the Air Ministry for this reason. It seemed to me when I was in office, and no less now, that the great problem of the Air Ministry is the. working out of the home defence scheme, and I cannot help regretting the result of the hon. Gentleman's proposal which will mean that this effort which should now be concentrated upon engines and machines for the home. defence scheme will be dissipated upon this new Department., which quite obviously, particularly at its commencement, must take up a large amount of the time of the Ministers and the experts of the Air Ministry. I hope that I have said enough to convince the Committee that there are great objections to the Government scheme.
That does not mean that I am not as anxious as they are to see airship de-
velopment, but it means rather that I am so anxious that I cannot help expressing my view that their scheme is likely to be. more expensive and less efficient in developing the air service than is the scheme for which the late Government was responsible. The result of the Government scheme is the building of a military airship when a commercial experiment is what is needed; the setting up of two separate organisations when one would do the work much better; and the dissipation of the efforts of the Ministers and the experts of the Air Ministry upon airship problems when they would both be much better engaged upon developing the home defence scheme and ensuring a quick supply of the best engines and machines in the world.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I wish to state at the beginning of my remarks that whatever may be thought of the late Government's scheme, in regard to which we have heard an apologia from the last speaker, and whatever we may think of the final decision reached by the Air Ministry, this House and the whole Empire should show some gratitude to the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney) for having kept this question alive almost alone and unaided. I know the difficulties the hon. and gallant Member had during the War to get the Admiralty to move upon the question of paravanes, and he is experiencing a similar difficulty in regard to this question of airships. Personally, I am very sceptical as to the ultimate value of airships either for commercial or military purposes. I do not want to enter into competition with the right hon. Baronet who has just spoken or his successor. To me they appear like two horse dealers, each trying to sell a horse to an unwilling purchaser. I say that because I think the state of the House this afternoon shows how much interest hon. Members really take in this estimate of £350,000, and the inauguration, if all goes well, of this great Imperial air roadway to our great Dominions and our blood-brothers across the sea.
If you are really convinced that the airship has a future for commercial and military purposes, of which I am very doubtful, there is a great deal to be said for taking up this brand new State service on national lines. You have here an opportunity for a practical experiment
in State Socialism, and if it had been a frank acceptance of that position and an embarkation on that experiment there would have been a good deal to be said for it. Unfortunately the Government, I suppose because they are not quite sure of their political position, are not prepared to go the whole hog in that direction. On the other hand, there is something to be said for leaving the matter entirely to private enterprise.
We know what private enterprise has done in the shipping industry, and it might be supposed that the same thing would happen in regard to this question. This scheme, however, is neither one thing nor the other. It is a little bit of private enterprise and a little bit of State Socialism, and I believe you are going to get the worst of both. I would like to ask the hon. Gentleman in charge of this Vote this question. The airship is supposed to have a utility, not for military purposes at all, but for naval purposes. I do not know where airships are going to be used for purely military purposes. The only military use made of them in the late War was to carry ammunition to the military forces in East Africa. For naval purposes, however, they may possibly have a utility, although with the development of the seaplane their utility will be largely diminished.
What I want to point out is that for naval purposes in regard to these airships you must have a non-inflammable gas, and I would like to ask what are our possible supplies of helium for this purpose? Have our experts gone into that question, because without helium an airship is extremely vulnerable, and, personally, I would not like to send up any of our men in airships filled with an inflammable gas in face of the rapid development of the naval air service. If these airships are to be used for naval purposes, where are they going to be used? Will they be used in the Indian Ocean, in the Mediterranean, or in the intermediate station? Will their shed he in Malta, Palestine, or some mandated area? They might be useful in the intermediate station for vessels operating over the Indian Ocean. If we are going to have a naval war in the future we may take it that it will be in the Pacific.
In the Pacific you will need your shed, and, therefore, you are bound really to have another shed built at Singapore or
somewhere else, to allow of operations over the Pacific. You might also need airships over the. Atlantic, and, therefore, I presume, you will have to come to some arrangement with the Irish Free State to erect one of these airship sheds in the West of Ireland. The hon. Member for Merthyr (Mr. Wallhead) inquired as to the cost, and I understand that the Minister is going to tell us presently what it is. For the modern airship, I presume, it will have to be a revolving shed, so that it can always be trimmed to the wind, with mooring masts, huts, wireless, and everything else, and that is going to be a very costly business. If the airships are really going to be used for naval purposes, one or two sheds at least will be wanted for the Pacific, and a couple more for the Atlantic, in addition to the intermediate one for the Mediterranean, and all that is going to cost a great deal of money. Moreover, just as, when you build your great ships, you say you must have docks, and the late Government embarked on the extraordinary adventure of Singapore, so, having got the airships, there will be a demand for airship sheds. What the ultimate cost will be I do not really know, but it will be very considerable.
I must say I think the money which it is proposed to spend on these airships could be much better used in other directions—aerial directions. We are promised, or, at least, the hope is held out to us of a voyage to India in five days. At present airships are not very reliable for voyages in the Mediterranean or round these Islands, but even to-day it would be possible, with proper organisation and development and a little energy, to organise a commercial air service to India in very little longer time by means of aeroplanes, and it would certainly be possible also to extend that service to Australia with aeroplanes at a. much less cost. The hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge, of course, shakes his head, and I am perfectly well aware where both his heart and his head are, but I have not, in talking about airships, mentioned Australia at all. It will involve a further great expenditure of money to extend the airship service to Australia, or to make preparations in Australia for the use of airships for naval purposes over those waters, but the development of an aeroplane passenger
and commercial service to Australia would be comparatively cheap. I would much rather see the money spent in that direction, and it could he done with the aeroplanes that we already have. That is where I should like to see the Air Ministry really getting busy and going ahead. I am very sorry that they find themselves hampered by the agreement with the present heavier-than-air company, which, I am afraid, will be rather a nuisance to us in the future.
I consider that the state of development of civil aviation at the present time is deplorable. Recent events are too fresh in the minds of every hon. Member present to need recall, but on technical grounds the aeroplane journey to India or Australia, with a little further development, is perfectly feasible, and would be most valuable to commercial men doing business with those two great Dominions. It is not so much the value of a quick passenger service, although that, of course, is important. It is the great value of being able to send documents—cheques, bills or acceptances—quickly by air. The transmission of all those interest-carrying documents more quickly from one place to another means a great saving in interest., and it means a quickening up of commercial transactions between this country and India—our greatest over-sea market, which takes the greatest proportion of our goods of any part of the world; and, of course, the same applies to Australia to a very great degree. That is the direction in which I should like to see this considerable expenditure, rising to nearly £1,500,000. Furthermore, as regards preparations for aerial warfare, I would rather see a proportion of the money devoted to. increasing our squadrons of aeroplanes for the purpose of home defence, or, rather, of counter-attack, as it will be.
I notice that the hon. Gentleman trots out the old reason for further expenditure upon what really are armaments, namely, that of giving employment. He is going to employ 400 men. I hope he will send his speech to-day to the Minister of Labour, who, I am sorry to see, is not present, because he will be able. to use it in to-morrow's discussion on that subject. At any rate, he will be able to point to one positive new remedy for unemployment which the present Government have introduced. I look upon the airship in
its present state of development as in the same situation as the sailing ship in the early days of steam vessels. In those days coaling stations were few and far apart, and the marine engine was imperfect. The sailing ship, therefore, had great uses then, and there are uses for it still, for that matter. During the next few years, while the aeroplane and seaplane remain imperfect and undeveloped, there may be a field for the airship, but I am perfectly certain that the heavier-than-air machine will finally oust the lighter-than-air machine. I am convinced of this from what I have been able to study on the subject and from inquiries I have. made.
I therefore consider that, placed as we are, this money would be far better spent on heavier-than-air craft and on heavier-than-air experiments, and that an Imperial aeroplane naval service should be initiated and developed by the present Government, providing splendid training for the men in flying the machines, and binding closer together the different parts of the Empire. Moreover, if we can develop air communication by aeroplane in conjunction with other countries, we shall do a tremendous deal to keep down artificial 'barriers 'between the peoples. That is where I think expenditure will be more valuable than on this extremely doubtful and hazardous experiment, which, as I have said, is a mixture of State Socialism and private enterprise—neither the one thing nor the other—as to which I have very grave doubts. At the same time, I do not want to vote against this Estimate. I am not convinced in my mind that the scheme will be a failure, but I am not convinced that it will be a success. I only hope it will be successful, and at a reasonable cost. I do not share the hostility of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chelsea. (Sir S. Hoare) to the Government's proposals, which have taken the place of his, and for very obvious reasons. I hope the Government. will succeed, but at the same time I ask them to pay very great attention to the one or two points which I have mentioned, and in which I think there may be some substance.

Mr. NICHOL: I should like to congratulate the Government upon one aspect of their Air Service policy. I should like to congratulate them on having turned down the airship policy
that was proposed by the previous Government. I think, however, that the Government have not gone quite far enough. In embarking on an airship scheme of their own, they are going into an experimental business. That is laudable in one sense, but I think there are much more urgent and necessary experiments in various other ways which would provide far more work than this particular one, and would be more useful, socially, to the nation. The previous speaker has mentioned that the public interest in airships, as it is shown by the interest here in this Chamber, is not extremely great. After all, so far as airships are concerned, public interest was at one period extremely great, but the history of public opinion, so far as airships are concerned, is for the most part a memory of disasters. There is not a single airship in the country in commission at the present time, and the inquiries into several of the disasters have shown that, compared with the heavier-than-air machine, the airship development is at an almost infantile stage.
We have to-day commercial services of aeroplanes starting almost as regularly as a train service to various parts of the Continent, and we have had aeroplane flights on a larger scale, all of which have come to disaster in one way or another, attempting to go round the world, showing that even the aeroplane, so far as great distances are concerned, is in the experimental stage and is by no means a commercial proposition. So far, however, as airships are concerned, their stage of development is embryonic in comparison. The question we have to consider to-day is, really, the proposal of the Government as compared with the scheme with which the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney) is associated. That scheme has been defended by the ex-Minister for Air as being a commercial scheme. That seemed to he the chief note of his speech—it was a genuine commercial experiment, the scheme was a commercial scheme. I tried to keep count, but probably, when hon. Members look over the OFFICIAL REPORT to-morrow, they will find that it was recommended as a. feasible commercial scheme over 20 times in the course of one speech.
I want just to deal with the nature of that commercial scheme. It was a scheme that was going to give a virtual
monopoly to one group—a group consisting, if I may so put it, of en engineering armament firm plus a petrol supply company, aided by a number of aeronautical enthusiasts. The group set out to do certain things, but in the process of their scheme they were going to get subsidies from the State to such an extent that no other firm or group of firms could possibly have competed with them. We were faced with the proposal to create a monopoly which was going to enjoy very large privileges, and was going to become embedded in our State machinery as an ex-Government Department. It was going, practically, to be a Government Department without any control. The scheme has been defended on the grounds that there were certain safeguards, but how much of the contribution to that scheme was to come from the State, and how much was to come from private enterprise—because that was held out by the ex-Minister for Air as being the chief safeguard? It is true that there were certain periods during which the scheme was going to operate, and during which it was going to be tested. It has been complained that the Government are only proposing to build one or possibly two airships, but I do not think that that proposal will be completed in any longer time than the first section of the Burney scheme. In the first part of the scheme the Government were going to put down £400,000, and the group were going to subscribe £200,000. I am not going into any of the technical difficulties, such as the question of mooring these great airships to monitors, or anything of that kind; I want simply to deal with the financial aspect of the matter. At the end of three years the Government would have subscribed an additional £1,200,000, and the private investors were going to produce £150,000. Then, in the third period, when there were to be three more airships—and this takes us eight years ahead—the Government were to produce another £1,200,000, and the group of private investors £150,000. Therefore, at the end of eight years, the total State contribution was going to be £2,800,000, and the private investors' commercial contribution was going to be £500,000. If this is going to be put before us repeatedly in speeches as being a commercial proposition, we wish to suggest that
I think in business even the Morris Motor Company, in spite of the taking off of the duties, could be quite easily run if it were going to be subsidised to the extent of £2,800,000, as against a private contribution of £500,000. Then again the fourth period took in another eight years and brings us forward 15 years in the total scheme. The Government contribution during that period was to have been £250,000 per annum, so that over the 15 years the total commitment of the Government was going to be £4,800,000. In addition the group was going to get a gift—because I do not think any money was mentioned—of five existing airships. They may be in a more or less derelict state. The stores and materials, as I think was suggested, cost over £1,000,000. Their present value may be as low as a tenth of that sum, but they have a present value, as has been shown by the experience of the Disposal Board. In addition these two properties were to be handed over to the group—the property at Pulham, estimated on a conservative basis to be worth £50.000, and the great Governmentt estate and sheds at Cardington, which cost the nation £500,000. I think it was specified that the State would retain a right over that property by the payment of a peppercorn rent—a rent estimated at something like 100th part of a farthing.
In this lauded commercial proposition the Government was going to contribute in assets and in money a total of almost £5,500,000. The total safeguard which was given for that was that the group were going to subscribe £500,000—an eleventh part of the money. Apart from the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Uxbridge, the group consisted financially of an engineering firm and a petrol supply company, and they could quite easily get their contribution back out of the profits on the actual building. One-eleventh is not a very big proportion to get returned in that way. I notice that as the scheme originally stood—it was said to be amended by the ex-Minister for Air—no repayments were going to be made. This money was to be lent interest free—a proposition which, when it was suggested it should be applied to housing, was turned down with derision. The money was to be given interest free and we were told that it was to be repaid, but a revelation was made, probably unwittingly, that the actual opinion of the ex-Minister
for Air was that repayments were entirely doubtful, and an actuarial calculation which was cited in another place in the Debate last week showed that if this company—I do not want to go into the question of the separation into an operating and a constructive company and a guarantee company—assuming phenomenal success, had been able to pay a 20 per cent. profit it would take at least 60 years to pay back. I am so pessimistic about airship development that I suggest that the ex-Minister's opinion that the repayments were extremely doubtful is likely to be nearer the truth.
The Government are to be congratulated on turning down that scheme. It was going to create a monopoly in the hands of the group over which extremely little control by the Government or by the public could possibly have been retained. It is true that certain tests had to be made at specified periods. They were technical tests, and were of such a nature that even though they had failed, the Government of the day would have been forced by financial pressure still to bolster up the company. We all know that, after a company has been committed to a certain amount of expenditure, there is extreme pressure to put more money in in order to save what has already gone. That is an argument which has been used repeatedly on the question of the guarantees and loans to the Sudan Government. It is extremely difficult, once committed to any such arrangement, for a Government, or even a private company, completely to extricate itself. The Government are to be congratulated on turning down the scheme. I only suggest that in putting forward their alternative scheme, while it will be clear of all the commercial difficulties and the chance of profits, which were extremely doubtful, the policy indicated by the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Central Hull (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy) is likely to be of more importance to this country than airship development. We have experiments going on certainly in various parts of the world, and in one or two countries in particular, but our own experience of airship development up to date has been very largely a series of disasters. There is such a thing as building a machine, necessarily of the lightest possible character, which becomes uncon-
trollable. It is all very well to go on increasing the capacity of your gas vessels, but there are certain factors to be taken into account and airships appear to be rapidly getting to a stage when human beings cannot control them, and we come to the proposition in the end that the question of the human factor in control is an extremely important one. I suggest the development, if necessary on commercial lines, of the aeroplane service, and the money proposed should be better spent on that than on the method suggested in this Vote.

Sir PHILIP SASSOON: I suppose it is natural for a new Government to take every opportunity they can of differing from the course laid down by their predecessors, but that I should have thought there were, in certain circumstances, occasions when even a new Government might follow upon the course which has been deliberately adopted by their predecessors, even though it might not be along the lines they would have advanced if they had only their own ideas to consider. For example, I should have imagined a Government which was so anxious to let it be known in the world that they had a considerable concern with the future of the Empire would have been. only too anxious to honour the commitments made by their predecessors in the matter of certain preferences. But after the contemptuous way in which this Government have treated the Dominions on certain questions of Preference which have been entered into by the late Government it is, I suppose, too much to expect that consideration would have been shown to a scheme which had been entered into by the late Government with an ordinary individual who happened also to be a member of the present Opposition. But it is at least permissible for every taxpayer to scrutinise the scheme which has been put up by the Government, and to see whether it is at least going to give us equal value for the same money. It is obvious immediately when one scrutinises this scheme that this is not the case at all. One is not getting the same value for one's money. In fact, I think if the Government had wanted to demonstrate to the country the superior advantages of Socialism over private enterprise, that is to say, whereby the geatest sum of money is spent with the least possible result, I think they could
not possibly hit upon a more convincing instance.
6.0 P.M.
We have heard to-day a great many figures and a great many facts. We have heard about peppercorn rents, and on both sides of the Committee we have been given a good deal of information. As far as I can gather, under the Burney scheme they were going to provide one airship, which was all that was necessary as a test, to demonstrate the practicability of inter-Empire transport by lighter-than-air vessels, and this was going to be done at a cost of £400,000. A good deal of this sum was to he covered by the assets of the Airship Construction Company. The Government scheme provides for two airships at a cost of £1,200,000, and if it is not a success it is to cost £1,350,000. So you have a Socialist Government paying £600,000, or perhaps £675,000, for a ship which private enterprise can provide at £400,000. Not only are they spending 50 per cent. more for this ship, but, with that open-handed generosity which characterises Socialists all over the world when dealing with other people's money, they are plunging on two ships at the risk of both of them having to be scrapped. The Government propose to spend nearly three times as much and to get identical results. That, I suppose, is Socialist finance, It is, in fact, a more illuminating and instructive illustration even than the Budget. After all, in the Budget other people's economies were being used for the purpose of buying popularity. Here we have constructive Socialism. We have the first fruits of the nationalisation of the means of production and distribution, and we can note the cost. Under the Burney scheme there was a group of expert business men and experts in airship construction who were risking their own money, their own time and their own reputation in the effort to make a commercial success of the building and running of airships. They were to be paid strictly by results, and failure at any stage meant the end of all Government assistance, and any hope of personal profit also came to an end. In the Government scheme that incentive to care, effort and invention, which always exists when people who are engaged in an undertaking realise that success or failure will make all the difference in regard to
their prosperity, is largely thrown away. That is not good business. If the Government scheme be undertaken and proves a failure, it is not merely that a greater sum of money will be lost than would otherwise be the case, but it means also that the opportunity will have been lost of developing inter-Empire transport.
It is idle to pretend that the Government scheme is necessary, for State or military reasons, for the purpose of keeping so important an Imperial service under State control. As far as I can gather, the Burney scheme provides at every turn, every safeguard for the most complete control by the State of everything which in private hands might conceivably be used to the damage of the State or of the public service. One of my right hon. Friends on this side said that it was very unfair to defend this scheme by comparing things that are not comparable. The total amount of public money which would become involved in the Burney scheme if it became a complete success is compared with what the Government is going to spend on the initial and experimental stage of its scheme. How much the Government scheme will eventually cost, if it is a success and is carried out to the full on Socialistic lines, we have not been told. Perhaps we are lucky to have an airship scheme at all, seeing that an airship scheme had already been laid down by the last Government. The whole thing might have gone the way of other things—the way the McKenna Duties have gone, and the way the Singapore base has gone. Fortunately, airship construction does not do direct, violence to the principles of Free Trade, and the possession of airships to guard our shores comes more closely home to some of us than do the advantages of having naval ports to guard our Dominions in the Pacific.

Notice taken that 40 Members were not present. House counted, and 40 Members being present—

Sir P. SASSOON: I only hope that in courting failure in going forward with this scheme hon. Members will not succeed in putting back airship construction for an indefinite period. Even the demonstration of the utter futility of their political and economic doctrines will be dearly bought at such a price.

Rear-Admiral SUETER: I have heard hon. Members say that they do not think that the airship is of much value. As an old naval airship officer, I should like to dip into the past and tell them one or two things about airships. In 1909 the Committee of Imperial Defence laid it down that the Navy were to develop rigid airships and the Army heavier-than-air machines. Consequently, the Admiralty laid down a rigid airship and carried out experiments with the "Mayfly," and she was afterwards wrecked through being structurally weak. Then they stopped building airships, but a little later the airmen pressed the Admiralty, and they gave us permission to develop non-rigid airships. We started and bought the "Parseval" airship from Germany and "Astra Torres" from France, and the Secretary of State for War gave to the Admiralty all the small military airships. We always thank him for the way the Army pilots trained the naval airship officers in air work.
The little flexible airships that we developed served as a small air fleet during the War. They did wonderful work. They patrolled all the waters round these islands, and there is no case on record of a merchant ship or any ship being sunk by an enemy submarine where these little airships were on patrol. They did very valuable work, and it is absurd for hon. Members to say that they are of no value. They showed how valuable they were, and we have to thank the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Wight (Major-General Seely), who was Secretary of State for War at that time, for starting us with them. We did not lose a life, and no ship was sunk where these little ships were on patrol.
After the wreck of the "Mayfly" the Admiralty stopped building rigid airships, and we could not get them to commence their construction for a long time. Just before the War we again got approval to build rigid airships, and we had No. 9 rigid under design when the War broke out. But the firm engaged in building the airship wanted to take on Russian munitions, which they thought were of greater value than rigid airships, and the building of that ship was suspended by order of the Admiralty. Owing to the activities of the Zeppelins in the North Sea, all naval people pressed for rigid airships again. We started once more to
build rigid airships, but they were too late to be of any value in the War. After the Armistice, No. 34 was flown by a very gallant officer, the late Commodore Maitland, across the Atlantic, from East Fortune to New York and back. It took four and a half days to go out to New York and three and a half days to return. That showed the value of rigid airships. Where you find the value of rigid airship's is in naval reconnaisance, and the intercepted wireless signals received from the German Zeppelins when plotted show the wonderful reconnaisance work done by them over the North Sea. They were the finest scouts, and the Germans said that for scouting purposes in normal weather one Zeppelin was equal to eight cruisers. Yet hon. Members say that airships are of no value. What did the First Lord say in another place the other day? Speaking for the Admiralty, he said that they wanted airships, and they wanted them quickly. It has taken all the work of the airship pioneers, the Great War and the work of the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney) to convince the Admiralty that airships are of value for reconnaisance purposes in naval warfare.
I want to deal with this Estimate. I had the privilege of listening to the Noble Lord the Air Minister in another place, where he made a very fine speech. As an old airship pioneer I should like to congratulate him. In the short time which he has been in office he has grasped the problem very well. What we are considering to-day are the merits of the Burney group scheme against the Government scheme. The Burney group scheme was to provide six airships for a term of 15 years, and I think they were to get £4,500,000 out of the taxpayers' pockets. I agree with some hon. Members that that would give the Burney group a monopoly, and I am very much against monopolies. In the early days of submarines, we gave a monopoly to a firm to build submarines, and I think every submarine officer will agree with me that we should have been much more advanced in submarine development when war commenced if we had not given that monopoly in the early days. I always tried to break it down, but without success.
If anybody examines this matter from an expert point of view, they will agree that the Government is quite right not to give a monopoly to this particular firm.
Without any offence to the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge, I maintain that his scheme fails over the mooring arrangements. He made no attempt to build a hangar, but simply provided for putting mooring posts up in India or using mooring masts erected in monitors. I anchored the first airship to a mooring mast on water, and we broke the "Mayfly" by that experiment. It is very difficult to moor an airship to a mast on water. It is easy to say, "Moor the airship to a mast on a monitor," but it is difficult. If you want to repair an airship on a particularly long voyage from this country to India, how are you going to repair a badly damaged gasbag or the fabric when ripped off a fin or rudder when moored to the mast of a monitor? It is impossible to do it satisfactorily, particularly if the outer cover was torn off in large pieces.

Lieut.-Commander BURNEY: It has been done.

Rear-Admiral SUETER: My hon. and gallant Friend says that it has been done, but he has not seen the big holes that I have seen, worn in the gas bags of airships by vibration. You cannot always carry out repairs at a mooring mast, and it is absurd for anyone to say so. You want a hangar, and a mast as an auxiliary. Wherever you have an airship station, you want a proper hangar and a mast, otherwise a mooring mast by itself is only a temporary arrangement for tieing up an airship at some place where you do not want to make a permanent base. Therefore, the hon. and gallant Member's scheme failed when he did not provide proper security for the airships and their crews. The Government scheme is to provide one airship built by the State and one built by a private company; but with so few airships, when you have your jigs and dies and everything together for construction, you will have a very difficult task to keep the men together. What are you going to do in regard to a private firm with 300 or 400 men used to turning out the first rigid, when the work has been carried out?
The Government scheme does not go far enough. I would like to see them come forward and ask not for the small sum for which they now ask, but for something like £10,000,000, to provide six
military airships and six commercial airships. That is what ought to be done. Hon. Members may laugh at my figure, but I would ask them to think of the large amount of money that has been expended in connection with the development of water ships. Look at the millions expended upon harbours and docks and quays—hundreds of millions. My scheme is for the spending of £10,000,000 for the provision of six military airships and six commercial airships, with airship sheds in Malta, Egypt, India, Australia, South Africa and Canada. If Canada had a scheme like that it would be well worth doing, because it would bring our Dominions into closer contact with the Mother country.
With regard to experimental work I do hope that the Under-Secretary will realise that there is no use carrying out experiments in laboratories for gas bags [...] hot climates. You want to send a complete section of an airship out to India. with its gas bag, hydrogen to inflate it, and to go into the whole question of leakage, by osmosis and of fabrics which will withstand a very hot climate, damage from actinic rays, and so on. You want to carry out a series of experiments on a full scale in the country itself to which you are going to send these airships. Otherwise you will be risking the lives of the pilots. In reference to the question of the gas to be used in these airships, I hope the Under-Secretary will appoint a small Committee to go into the whole question of helium, as mentioned by the hon. Member for Hull. In America you will get helium gas from hot springs and a certain amount from Canada, and though you may lose some 6 per cent. of lift by using helium, yet it is a noninflammable gas and makes the work far more safe for the crews. I congratulate the Under-Secretary very much on the way which he has put forward his Estimate.
With regard to crews. I hope that he will go into the whole question of training the pilots, because many of them have been dispersed and they want training in balloons and in flexible airships before they can work rigid airships. He has put forward a very good case and I congratulate him on doing so. I think he has lost his New Testament, and I am not quite certain that the Secretary of State for War has not pinched it from him.

Major-General SEELY: I do not propose to go into the question of the relative merits of the Government scheme, and the scheme which is known as the Burney scheme. I think there is force in what the late Secretary of State for Air (Sir S. Hoare) says. I am inclined to think it might have been better to have concentrated more upon the commercial aspect, but I realise the arguments upon the other side, and I do not think anybody in this House will quarrel seriously with the hon. Gentleman when he says he is pressing forward experimental work on airships. The gallant Admiral speaks with exceptional knowledge. He was associated with me in the very beginning in the air business. We were together on the very first Committee which the Government set up, and the whole air service owes him a very deep debt of gratitude. I agree with what he says as to the necessity of being ready to continue the examination, but perhaps it might be better to see how this great ship works before we committed the country to any further expenditure.
It is a fact and a curious fact and a hopeful fact that although the bigger you build an aeroplane the more difficult it becomes, for various technical and obvious reasons with regard to span, stress and levels, the bigger the airship the easier the problem becomes. So supposing the design to be accurate, supposing your estimates are correct, which they are not always, it is much easier, from an engineering point of view, as a problem, to build an airship of 5,000,000 cubic feet capacity than to build an airship of 3,000,000 cubic feet capacity. In the case of the aeroplane it is the exact contrary. The bigger you build it the greater the problem becomes, so that when you get to a size a very little larger than the largest which is now built the problem, so far as our present knowledge goes, becomes insoluble. That is an argument in favour of continuing the experiments with airships, to see if we really could work the sizes.
I would ask the Under-Secretary one question with regard to mooring masts. How far have the experiments gone which have been conducted as to the possibility of mooring these big vessels in considerable gales of wind? I know that at least two airships have been tested to
destruction at mooring masts, but I have been told that there is real hope, even in a full gale of wind, of constructing mooring mast in a particular way which will enable a ship of over 5,000,000 cubic feet capacity to ride out a storm. If that be so, I would plead with the Under-Secretary, if need be, to come to Parliament for a further Estimate so that we may have a number of such mooring masts between here and India. The recent disaster to a French airship, which we all deeply deplore, shows the need for mooring masts if they can be made in a way to be of any value.
It is true that there is more reliability about an airship, especially of the type that is proposed to be built, than you could get in the case of aeroplanes. The fact that the force of gravity is not opposed to it is in itself an immense advantage. Nevertheless, if an airship had the choice of several places to go to where it could tie up, that might be the means of saving the whole ship and, what is more important still, the 40 or 50 men on board. The importance of mooring masts lies in the fact that, unlike ships at sea, the construction of any kind of harbour is a matter of such immense cost, relatively, to the use which would be made of it, and to the cost of the ship, that I should imagine that a hangar in Egypt or elsewhere to house such ships would cost more than the ship itself. Therefore, if you wished to establish a great string of hangars all along the route, the cost would be prohibitive, and you must concentrate on mooring masts. I am glad that the Government have decided to go on, because if they find that these airships do succeed, and if they find that the very first trial should promise success, they should then continue their efforts so that in this matter of lighter-than-air craft we may regain the supremacy which we had been in danger of losing.

Captain BRASS: I was not at all surprised to hear the remarks of the hon. Member for East Renfrew (Mr. Nichol) who is unfortunately not present at the moment, because when comparing the granting of money for the Morris motor car and the granting of money for subsidised airships, he exemplified well the lack of imagination and the small mindedness of hon. Gentlemen opposite. You could not very well find two things
so totally different. In the one case you are trying to develop a great Imperial airship scheme; in the other case you are merely trying to develop the building of a particular kind of motor car in this country. I agree entirely with most of the remarks made by the hon. and gallant Member for Hull. I am one of those people who, I am afraid, have not very great faith in airships, and I would rather see the money spent on heavier-than-air than lighter-than-air machines.
The Under-Secretary of State for Air was not, I think, quite accurate when he said that under the Burney scheme the only landing arrangements which the promoters of that scheme were proposing to arrange was that the airships should be moored to a mooring mast on monitors. That seems to be a preposterous suggestion. I cannot believe that in the scheme put forward by the Secretary of State for Air that was the only thing which the Burney scheme had suggested. I do not want to go into the question of whether private enterprise or a, State monopoly should be preferred, though from various speeches. delivered from the other side it does look as if the Government were trying to substitute private enterprise for its pet hobby of State socialism. What we have to consider more than anything else is what are we going to get out of this money?
Under the Burney scheme, the amount to be spent was £4,800,000. That was to be spread over a period of 15 years, and we were only going to spend that £4,800,000 on one condition. That was that the scheme was a success. I am certain that most Members in this House would agree that if you could establish a regular bi-weekly service between this country and India, it certainly would be worth the subsidy of £4,800,000 which is suggested. But we must remember that under the first part of the Burney scheme, £400,000 was to be provided by the Government and £200,000 by private enterprise, and that if the conditions laid down were not successful the loss would have been cut after the £400,000 had been spent by the State, and the £200,000 by the company. That is, if at the end of a certain period the company was not able to make an airship which within seven days had been able to go to India, then the second part of the scheme would not come into operation. Therefore if
the original scheme had not been successful, we could have cut our loss for a sum of £400,000. We could also have cut our loss in the second stage if the company had been successful, and had been able to fly an airship as far as India. Then the company was going to be given £400,000 a year for a period of three years—that was £1,200,000—provided that the public also subscribed another £150,000. At the end of that period, unless the company had been able to produce a weekly service for a period of three months, the loss up to that time could also be cut, that is we could have got out with a loss of £1,600,000 and a loss to the investing public of £350,000.
So it is not quite fair to say that you have two schemes, and that one scheme is going to cost the country £4,800,000 and the other £1,360,000. They are totally different schemes altogether. I do not think that, even if an airship were constructed to go as far as India, the second payment of £400,000 a year for three years, that is £1,200,000, is quite justify able. It would be quite easy to build an airship, and in fact airships have already been built, that could go as far as India in seven days. If an airship can do that journey, or even go across the Atlantic and come back again, it does not mean that you will be able to provide a regular weekly or bi-weekly airship service to India or to Australia. I am afraid that I am not a very great believer in
lighter-than-air craft. I do not think we can ever get over the dangers and difficulties in connection with hydrogen. It is very explosive and dangerous. I am sceptical as to whether we can produce helium in large quantities in this country in the way that we produce hydrogen. In any case, it has not got quite the same lift. I would like to quote what the Secretary of State for Air said in another place:
If airships can he operated in all climates and even under adverse weather conditions, probably there will he a great commercial future for them and by their means it may be possible"—

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I understand that the hon. and gallant Gentleman is quoting a speech made in another place. That is against the rule.

Captain BRASS: The gist of what the Secretary of State for Air said in another place was that if you could produce air-
ships which would rise under abnormal weather conditions, and be operated in difficult climatic conditions, they would be extremely useful. With that I entirely agree. But the question which we have to decide is whether the scheme of the Government for reconditioning an old airship will prove that they can do that Everyone knows the inherent difficulty of landing an airship with its enormous bulk, The big airships are to displace five million cubic feet. That in itself makes landing extremely difficult. The airship is not, like the heavier-than-air machine, which can fly down; it must take up a very large space. Another difficulty is with the diffusion of hydrogen from the balloons in hot climates. I was in charge of one in the East, and there we had the greatest difficulty in keeping our hydrogen pure, because the rays of the sun affected the fabric, and immediately there was a diffusion going on, and after a very short time the result was that we got, not pure hydrogen, but a very explosive mixture of air and hydrogen. There are many things which make airships a very difficult proposition indeed. The example of the Dixmude is not very helpful. The disaster at Hull was also an example of what might happen to an airship. That ship broke in half. The Dixmude is a better example.
One can imagine the awful agony of about 200 people—that crews of these airships are to reach that total, I understand—if their airship were in a position like that of the Dixmude, when one of the engines or some of the engines had gone wrong or were out of place. There would be an enormous airship of 5,000,000 cubic feet capacity, with 200 people aboard drifting along and not knowing where to land. It is impossible to land an airship under such conditions. I know what it is like to try to land an ordinary balloon of 60,000 cubic feet when it is drifting along in any sort of wind. I have tried, when it was going along at the rate of 30 miles an hour. The first thing is that the basket turns over and you are lucky if you are
not shot out. One can imagine what would happen if it were a 5,000,000 cubic foot airship in the condition of a free balloon with 200 people inside and unable to land anywhere. What would probably happen would be that the crew would attempt to get out in parachutes, or some of them would, because, naturally, an
airship would be rigged with a proper number of parachutes. The first, two or three people might get out with parachutes quite easily, and the airship would not go up to a great extent, because the people would not weigh very much compared with the enormous bulk of gas in the ship. But if a large number of the crew tried to escape while the airship was drifting about the airship would go up higher and higher and would eventually reach an enormous height, losing all its buoyancy with the increasing height, and ultimately it
would have to come down. It would come down like the balloon to which have referred, and it would be destroyed in exactly the same way as the Dixmude; it would be broken to pieces.
I want to ask the Under-Secretary of State what is meant by the statement that £1,200,000 is to be spent on airship experiments and airship research. What. is he going to do with the money? As far as I can see we cannot experiment very much in airships, because we know the difficulties of landing and so on. Is the Department going to experiment in producing a more efficient engine, or is it going to try to produce another kind of gas to take the place of hydrogen, or is it going to make experiments with mooring masts? Those are questions which all of us ought to ask. Are we going to get real value for the expenditure? Would it not be much better to spend this money on heavier-than-air craft? I think it would be better to try to develop flying boats. If you are going to try to get communication between an island like this and our Dominions beyond the seas, you could do it very much more easily by having something that you can land with less difficulty than an airship—something which could be landed at different places, something which has not always to be guided to a landing mast or something like that, but could more or less skirt a shore, and, if anything did happen to go Wrong, would not be, absolutely at the mercy of the elements, and could come down and have a sort of natural aerodrome on the sea in the lee of the land. You could come down and land in the lee of the shore, and there your passengers would be more or less safe. At any rate, they would not be in such a very precarious position as they undoubtedly would be if they were in an airship which was out of control.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: What would you do if you were on a lee shore?

Captain BRASS: I appeal to the Under-Secretary to consider the suggestions which I have made. I do not want to vote against this Estimate. I hope that the experiments which are to be made will be a success, but at the same time I think the hon. Gentleman ought to consider very carefully on what he spends the sum to be devoted to experiments and to make sure that the money will not be wasted.

Mr. WELLS: I welcome the fact that the Government have seen the necessity of airships. There has been considerable distress in my constituency of Bedford since the aerodrome there was closed. I wish to ask the Under-Secretary of State whether he will give ex-service men, and ethers employed at that aerodrome in the past, the first opportunity of work, as far as that is possible. When the airship is built what is to happen to the employés at that aerodrome? It seems to me that the Government would provide work for about 400 people for a comparatively short time, whereas if they were putting another airship down work would be continuous for some time to come. I think that we might have had a more detailed statement about these airships. I understand that the Government propose to spend £1,200,000 in the next three years, but I anticipate that their scheme will cost very much more than that—pretty well double. I believe that the station in India will cost £250,000, according to the statement made in another place, and that the intermediate station will probably cost another £250,000. If the Government will give us more details of their plan it will be much more satisfactory.

Mr. AMERY: My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Clitheroe (Captain Brass) and one or two other Members have criticised the whole idea of devoting public money to further experiment and development in airship work. They have suggested that this money had better be devoted to heavier-than-air development and they have also suggested that all the evidence, so far, shows that heavier-than-air aviation is more important and more likely to develop than lighter-than-air aviation. I think at the very outset it is
desirable to say that this is not the opinion of all the technical experts with whom the late Government, and. I understand, the present Government, have been in close consultation. The real fact is that the fields of the two are entirely different. The aeroplane is, of course, far more formidable as a weapon of war. Its speed and fighting qualities put it in a category entirely different from that of the airship. But the airship enjoys certain other advantages which are calculated to make it much more important from the point of view of commercial development. It has not to spend great effort in overcoming gravity, and consequently it can carry a, much greater volume of freight or passengers for a much smaller expenditure of money than the aeroplane—for infinitely smaller expense. It can fly day and night and, what is also not unimportant, it can do so with great comfort to the passengers.
The hon. and gallant Member for Central Hull (Lieut.-Commander Ken- worthy) suggested that in future we should fly regularly to India by aeroplane. Two or three hours' flight by aeroplane is a little thing, but a flight occupying days in succession is a tremendous strain which nobody would willingly undergo unless it was absolutely and urgently necessary to do so. On the other hand—and I am speaking with, at any rate, a little experience—a passage on a great airship in ordinary weather conditions is the most ideally comfortable method of travel in the world. It is like travelling on a great ocean liner in a dead calm sea, and on the airship not only there will be decent sleeping accommodation and all the rest, but very reasonable walking accommodation. In fact, the accommodation on the larger airship of the future will be not very much less than that in this Chamber. These factors, combined with cheapness, make it possible that in the airship we may get a method of travel and light freight carriage of incalculable importance in the future development of the British Empire. The Under-Secretary of State for Air very truly said that the development of airships may have a great bearing upon the political unity of the British Empire. May I put forward just one instance. Had it been possible to-day to bring the Prime Ministers of the Dominions back to this country in a few days, would not the obvious solution of such questions as
Singapore and Imperial Preference have been to convene another Conference and arrive at unanimity, thereby solving these questions by agreement in the Empire? Very real political difficulties are often caused by the fact that after a Conference meets, Governments change and a new Government is either bound to do what it does not agree with or else throw over agreements which have been arrived at in the Conference. Here is a practical solution.
Again, most hon. Members of this House want to see something of the British Empire, but we know how great are the practical difficulties in view of the short vacations of this House. If we could visit South Africa in four days, the West Indies in three days, Canada in two days, Australia in ten days, it would give to all far greater opportunities in this respect than are enjoyed at present, and it would, in time. have an incalculable effect upon the whole sentiment of Imperial unity. The same applies, as the Under-Secretary for Air rightly said, to the question of development. Development depends enormously upon those who have the capital actually seeing the projects in which they are asked to invest money. It has always struck me as one of the greatest factors in the development of the United States that your American business man in New York can any day get into the evening train and in 24 or 48 or 72 hours inspect on the spot some business proposition thousands of miles away in which he has been asked to invest.
From all these points of view there are, if airships can be proved, very great possibilities in front of them. The same is true, though in a lesser sense, as regards defence. The airship in itself is not a fighting instrument: it is, as the hon. and gallant Member for Central Hull has remarked, much too fragile and much too easily destroyed. Even with helium it is not a very strong instrument, though I may say, that even without helium there are various methods by which it could be made more immune than it was in the late War. But the real value of the airship in the future is that of a commercial vessel which can be turned to certain subsidiary purposes in the event of war. It could be used in an emergency for the very rapid conveyance of troops. The time will come when the
airship can be used for the conveyance of aeroplanes. But in the near future its greatest value, by far, will be in the service it can render to the Navy by reconnaissance over the great ocean spaces. I am not speaking of reconnaissance work in the neighbourhood of the enemy's main fleets, where undoubtedly its vulnerability would diminish its usefulness, but there are vast spaces of ocean, which, as the late War showed, have to be watched. The late War was one in which we fought in circumstances of peculiar advantage to this country in this respect, that the enemy had only one outlet to the open sea which we were able to block. In any other war with any other naval Power it would be impossible to block the cruisers and commerce raiders of that other Power, and we should always have on our side a demand for cruisers which could never be satisfied. The possession of airships with their very long cruising capacity and immense range of vision, could do a very great deal to diminish the costly demand for additional cruisers.
In that respect, the commercial airship borrowed for naval purposes or possibly for military and Air Force purposes, may be of the very greatest value. Of course it has to be proved fully, but I think the hon. Member for Eastern Renfrew (Mr. Nichol) and some of the others who spoke have underrated the extent to which the airship has already been proved. In this country very little has been done, but in Germany, up to the War, hundreds of thousands of miles were flown and many tens of thousands of passengers carried without any serious accident whatever. I ought to add that in Germany development has been stopped since by the Versailles Treaty. In this country important experiments have been carried out, and after all a British airship was the first successfully to cross the Atlantic and come back again, and as tributes have been paid to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney) for his perseverance in this matter, I hope I may be pardoned if I add a word of tribute to the devoted and invaluable services of Air Commodore Maitland, a most gallant and distinguished officer, who gave his whole life to this work and actually sacrificed it in the disaster that happened at Hull. It is said that the risks are still serious in airship development, but hitherto accidents have
been largely due to frailty of construction, which in turn is due to the endeavour to build an airship for military purposes—to render it capable of rising to a very high level and also of carrying guns and other military additions. It was that and nothing else which was responsible, I believe, for the Hull disaster. The airship which is built purely for commercial purposes, especially the larger airship, will have a much greater safety factor. So much for the question of risk.
I entirely agree with my right hon. and gallant Friend the late Secretary of State for Air that the right policy in this matter is a commercial policy. The time may come when it will be desirable to evolve a special type of airship for fighting purposes, but we are still far from that point, and what we need, even as regards defence, is a large number of commercial vessels. Two airships, or even six airships, amount to very little from the point of view of the Navy. It is not six but 60 or 600 commercial airships, with all the apparatus of masts, bases and sheds, developed in the ordinary way of commerce, which will be of any real use in the defence of the British Empire. It is by that standard, I suggest, we ought to judge any scheme put before this House. I do not propose to go at any length into the criticisms which have been directed against the Burney scheme on financial grounds. I would just say this, that the Under-Secretary of State. for Air, following the Prime Minister and following the Secretary of State for Air in another place, has gone on the assumption all the time that a State expenditure of £4,800,000 is involved. I submit that is a most unlikely result from the carrying out of the Burney scheme. As has already been explained, that scheme was to be in stages, and if there was a failure in the earlier stages, the Government liability would stop. If there is not a failure, if there is a success, the chances are that it will be a real success, a commercial success, and once you have a commercial success, naturally, there will be profits, with every reasonable anticipation of the repayment of this advance, not in the indefinite future but in the near future.
7.0 P.M.
I know it has been suggested in another place that even with a profit of 20 per cent. the Government could not be repaid for 60 years. I have not investigated
the calculation, but it occurred to me the moment I read it, that if the company were making 20 per cent, on a service of six airships it naturally would not stop at that, but would at once launch out into much bigger operations, and make a much bigger total volume of profit out of which it would be able to repay the Government advance in a much shorter time. That brings me to the other suggestion that what we contemplated was a monopoly. My hon and gallant Friend the Member for Hertford (Rear-Admiral Sueter) suggested there were parallels between the encouragement given to a particular firm under the Burney scheme and the quasi-monopoly which he suggested was held by a particular firm building submarines. In that case, the particular firm was building something for the Government, in other words, for a very limited market, but if airships succeed, as I believe they will, the moment they are proved there will be any number of capitalists willing to find the money to launch new airship schemes in competition with the older company or to open new services. If the older company has had the advantage of a Government subsidy it has also suffered from the immense disadvantage of the cost of pioneering. Everything they do will cost them 50 to 100 per cent. more than the cost will be to their successors. Once you begin to turn out airships every six weeks, one after the other, as the Germans were doing during the War, you will be turning them out at half the cost of the present estimate. The successors of the pioneer company will gain by their experience. We had a similar parallel in this House only a few weeks ago, when attention was drawn to the subsidy paid to the Cunard Company. That subsidy was well justified to induce them to run ships at a speed which 25 years ago was not an economic speed. Since then any number of companies have run ships across the Atlantic at a much higher speed and done good business by doing so. It is simply a question of giving a real start to commercial enterprise, and if one commercial enterprise can prove itself with the help of the Government, then I believe other commercial enterprises will be able and willing to have a much smaller subsidy or no subsidy whatever to carry out the immense expansion which will be of real value either from the Imperial or the trade or the defence point of view.
What is the Government scheme? It is a scheme in which in the first instance, the Government builds a ship from the fighting point of view. I suggest that is entirely premature. We want to see hundreds of ships operating regularly from the commercial point of view before we consider what modification or revision is desirable to create the fighting service airship of the future. It is, as my right hon. Friend pointed out, really rather absurd developing a great staff both in the Air Ministry and at Cardington in order to build one ship. Would anybody suggest that the Admiralty should open a new dockyard to build or repair one ship? It is obviously ridiculous. The whole effort is only worth while if you are going to have a continuous policy. Is it the policy of the Government to build one ship at this very great expense and then leave Cardington derelict, or is it their policy to turn out ship after ship as rapidly as possible? Do they mean to turn out a great fleet of military fighting airships? How are they going to man them and find the great expenditure which will grow round them?
On the other hand, are they contemplating turning out a great fleet of commercial ships? If so, what commercial service are they going to organise all over the world? There may be something to be said for collective social ownership of things that have been well proved and have got more or less into a groove like gas and water—I might even concede railways—and which are in the territory of the Government which undertakes the ownership. But here you are dealing with something absolutely experimental where any amount of money may be wasted. More than that, you are dealing with something which is going to operate not in this country but in the area of other countries. If there is one thing likely to lead to difficulties it is when a Government attempt to operate in the area and jurisdiction of another Government. It will be difficult enough for the British Government to operate bases or sheds in the jurisdiction of the Dominions, but the moment you come to a question of foreign countries you are in a much greater difficulty. I should like to ask the Under-Secretary, Ion this very question of intermediate stations, will the best station, from the point of view of commercial traffic or
even from the point of view of some of the naval work, necessarily be on British territory? If it is not, then surely it is much better to have that intermediate station built by a commercial company for ordinary commercial purposes, just as our ships work, say, in Alexandria harbour, and not to be faced with a crisis when you try to enforce quasi-military jurisdiction in the territory of another Government. These vessels, in so far as they are any use for defence purposes, will in the near future be mainly useful for the Navy. Will the hon. Member assure us that both in the construction of these ships and in the experiments carried out as well as in the selection of intermediate stations and sheds, they are going to co-operate in the closest manner with the Admiralty and secure the approval and concurrence of the Admiralty for the arrangements they make? If these ships are in the first instance to be used for naval purposes, surely it, is essential that the Admiralty should approve entirely of the policy that is being carried out.
I will now turn to the other side of their curiously hesitating and half-hearted policy. They have arranged for the building of one airship of a commercial kind. Are they going to work it? Apparently not. They are going to sell it back to the same company under another name. The Under-Secretary spoke with some doubt and suspicion of the difference between a building company and an operating company. I should have thought that there was no difficulty about that. After all, steamships, as a rule, are not built by the company that operates them. But what he is proposing involves the same thing. He buys an airship from a building company, and, even if it he nominally the same company, sells it back at a reduction. Nobody can conduct a commercial service with one ship. Is he going to follow this up by ordering commercial airships from this company or another company? The Committee is left entirely in the dark as to the policy. The policy of the late Government was perfectly simple. No military airship built for the present; a policy extending over 15 years and encouraging a fleet of commercial airships, which we hoped long before the end of these 15 years would lead to a great development of commercial air traffic. That at the maximum might have cost £4,800,000 or £320,000 a year. The
Government started with two ships which, in three years, are going to cost £1,200,000 at the least, or £1,350,000, i.e., over £1,600,000 a year. At the end of that time, having spent more money, we shall be just where we are to-day. To get a commercial service started you will still have to give a pioneer company some definite subsidy. After the three years are over, if they are in power, they will have to come back to the hon. Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney), or some other commercial firm, and make a new bargain, and I am by no means sure they will make a better bargain than we did. If they had gone whole-heartedly for State construction that would have been intelligible, and there would have been a policy, and they might have given some indication of where that policy was meant to lead. As it is, we have two disconnected experiments. With regard to neither of them, do we know what they are going to lead to.
What is the policy? Is it to be a great development of fighting aircraft and of great and unnecessary expenditure involved coming from a pacifist Government, or is it to be a great expansion on the commercial side? If it be the latter, why not adopt that policy from the start? If it be the former, why not avow it to the House of Commons? It looks to me that what has happened is that the Government, partly afraid of doing anything that looked like encouragement of private capital, partly yielding to that instinct for expansion—I will not say megalomania—which exists in every great department—have produced a very fumbling and half-hearted scheme—I do not think it. deserves to be called a scheme—a very fumbling and half-hearted beginning of doing for airships something they do not quite know what and certainly do not inform the House about. I think they have made, in regard to a very important aspect of national and Imperial development, a very great mistake. To vote against their proposals would throw back the airship work even further. But I do hope the Government will at the earliest opportunity tell us what they really have in view. Are they in favour of commercial airship development, or are they building a great military fleet for I do not know what purpose?

Mr. LEACH: This has been an interesting Debate, and some very interesting points have been raised which it is my business to pay attention to if I can. First of all, let me say that with the criticism of the right bon. Baronet the ex-Secretary of State for Air (Sir S. Hoare), who urges that the cutting down of our commitments in regard to airship schemes is bad, on the one hand, and the attitude taken up by the hon. and gallant Member for Hull (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy), who fears that we are going to spend far too much on airships, on the other hand, I feel in a contented and happy frame of mind, because, apparently, we must have hit something like the natural, healthy medium. A good many questions have been put to me by the last speaker as to where we are going, and what is to be the end of this policy, and what we visualise. I cannot tell him. We are in the position of looking at an industry which is more or less dead, and which we want to put upon its feet again if that is at all possible. The airship industry has had a chequered past. There is no complete certainty about security in its future. I know that the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Commander Burney) has a great deal of confidence. I know he has examined this problem with a good deal of care and a lot of enthusiasm, and has come to the conclusion that airships are going to be a practical proposition for the benefit and comfort of mankind. He may be right. It is good to see so much enthusiasm in a cause which undoubtedly, if it succeeds, is going to add to the well-being and the comfort of mankind at large. The Government are making it their business to initiate experiments for the purpose of seeing if the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge is right. I believe he will turn out to be right, and I am content in asking the Committee to grant us this money for the purpose of making those experiments. We are going to build one airship for commercial passenger work and another far service purposes.
The right hon. Baronet the ex-Secretary of State for Air charges me with the contention that we were actually prepared to build an airship which was completely and solely for military purposes—a thing he would never have dared to do. As a matter of fact, under the Burney scheme there were to be six airships all of which were to have a military basis, and two of
which were to be constructed for the purpose of being of particular service use, and in the case of each of them there was to be a heavy payment as a retaining fee for war service if they should ever be required. Against these six military airships surely our one looks comparatively modest. [An HON. MEMBER: "If you take the commercial airship it makes two!"]

Sir S. HOARE: Does the hon. Gentleman really suggest that the Burney airships were military airships?

Mr. LEACH: No, they were going to be built with a view to their use for military purposes. Their method of construction was to be of such a character that they would serve a military sense, and the fact that they were regarded by the ex-Minister of Air as a very valuable military adjunct indeed was demonstrated by the fact that he was prepared to pay a retaining fee for eight years of £250,000 a year. The right hon. Baronet further said that the Burney scheme was going to provide six ships to our two. As a matter of fact our scheme will provide three, two new ones and a reconditioned old one. The right hon. Gentleman appears to forget. that the six ships under the Burney scheme were to take seven years to build whereas our three ships were to be provided inside three years. Further, we shall by our method of doing it bring into existence a new factory for building airships. In place of one factory for the construction of airships, when our scheme begins to operate there will be two. It is idle, therefore, to urge that under the Government scheme the construction of airships will be on a restricted plan as compared with the Burney scheme because the fact is quite the other way.

Mr. AMERY: Are we to understand that at Cardington construction will go on steadily after the first airship has been built?

Mr. LEACH: I am coming to that point now. I am asked what our intentions are when the scheme, which is to take three years, is fulfilled. I am not in a position to give an adequate answer to that question, but I should like to say that undoubtedly Cardington will be employed permanently for building airships in the name of the Government.

Mr. AMERY: Commercial or service airships?

Mr. LEACH: When the need for military airships disappears it will be for commercial ships, but so long as the need for military airships exists the Government are going to pay attention to that need. Under this scheme we are hoping to build at twice as fast a rate as is provided by the Burney scheme. We are laying the foundation for a great and new enterprise for the building of airships. I am asked whether we will work alongside the Admiralty for all ships that may be designed for naval purposes. Not only can that promise be given, but I may say it is what we are doing at the present moment. Then I am asked whether we are going to conduct the passenger service to India when the passenger ship is built. The first intention is to offer it to the contractors who have built the ship—to offer it to them to undertake the service themselves. If it should tern out that they are not willing or prepared to make arrangements for the conduct of the passenger service to India, then I daresay the Government may feel itself in the position of having to conduct that service and they will make their preparations accordingly. But I am not authorised to say that the Government are going to conduct this passenger servire to India. Our purpose is to give the contractors the option of doing it.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: But what is to happen if the contractors are unwilling? It is important to be prepared. Supposing the contractors are half-hearted in the matter, cannot the Government undertake to do it?

Mr. LEACH: We are talking of a period which has two years to run. If this Government be in office, as it is natural to assume from the prospects that it will be, and if our needs have grown, which it is natural to assume they will, then I have no hesitation in saying—without being able to give an undertaking in the name of a future Government of which I may or may not be a member—that I can see a picture of the Government of this country conducting with enormous success a mail, freight and passenger service to India for the great and lasting benefit and comfort, not only of the people of this country, but those of India as well.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Why cannot you do it now with aeroplanes?

Mr. LEACH: Unfortunately, there are difficulties in the way, and they are difficulties not of our creation, but they prevent us doing it. I am told that our agreement with the new Heavier-than-air Transport Company would prevent us doing it.

Sir S. HOARE: Can the hon. Gentleman say what particular provision in the agreement with Imperial Airways Limited is the obstacle?

Mr. LEACH: I do not want to go into that, but our agreement with Imperial Airways Limited has led us to believe that there are difficulties in the way of our conducting such a service.

Sir S. Hoare: This statement is incorrect, and I must correct it. The hon. Member is free to make any agreement that he likes for an Imperial Air Route, with heavier-than-air craft.

Mr. LEACH: The right. hon. Baronet is not a believer in Government construction. He has told us so in plain, unvarnished terms. But during the War we did this wicked thing, and not only did we establish the finest, biggest and most efficiently equipped manufacturing concern for building airships, but we proceeded to build airships with considerable success at Cardington in the name of the Government. It is a practice which really started with Henry VIII, who began building ships which went on water and not into the air at Portsmouth in the name of the Government, and we are merely continuing that practice. Several important questions have been asked as to what is going to happen at Cardington when this airship has been built. Are the workpeople to be sacked or discharged and will the works be closed down? Naturally the Member for the division in which Cardington is situated is concerned to know the answer to those questions. I want to assure him, therefore, it is the intention of the Government to keep the place on its feet. Whether it is to be in the future conducted by private enterprise I cannot say, but at any rate when our experiments have been allowed to proceed to their fulfilment then I think it may be prophesied with a great deal of certainty that not only will Cardington be continued as an airship building factory, but other factories will have to be erected to cope with the demand.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Can we have the cost of the airship shed?

Mr. LEACH: The cost of a shed is estimated at about £100,000, but when the cost of the general equipment and the mooring masts is added, the total will probably work out at £250,000.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Will it be a revolving shed or a fixed shed?

Mr. LEACH: A fixed shed, I believe.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: But it is a revolving shed which is most needed.

Mr. LEACH: I have been asked also with regard to research respecting climatic conditions. Experiments in that regard will have to be made before the periodical service begins to operate regularly. They are going to cost money. We have to spend money in various ways, in order to make sure that when the ship begins flying, it will fly under conditions of safety as far as we can insure them.

CIVIL SERVICES SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATE, 1924–25.

CLASS II.

FISHERY BOARD FOR SCOTLAND.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £150,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1925, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Fishery Board for Scotland, and for Grants in Aid of Pier's or Quays and of Marine Superintendence, also for Loans to Herring Fishermen for the Purchase of Drift Nets.

The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Mr. William Adamson): Hun. Members are familiar with the object of this Estimate. As a matter of fact, the necessity for providing this new service has been pressed upon me by Members from all parts of the House. These representations were made for the purpose of getting the Government to make loans, through the Fishery Board for Scotland, to the herring fishermen in Scotland for the purchase of the drift nets so necessary for enabling them successfully to pursue their calling. Let me remind the House at the outset that the herring fishery industry in Scotland is organised upon a special basis,
which is represented—and I think with good rrason—as being of peculiar value to the community, industrially and socially. The special feature is that the great majority of the Scottish herring vessels with their nets and gear are owned by the fishermen who work them. In other words, the working fishermen are responsible for providing and replacing, as required, the necessary equipment. This Scottish system of fishermen-owners has proved of good service in normal times, but it leads to a special problem in the bad times through which the industry has been passing recently. The case for the proposal is briefly that the principal markets for the Scottish herring fishing industry, namely, Germany and Russia, have been closed or disorganised within recent years, due to the War.

Mr. MILLS: And previous Governments.

Mr. ADAMSON: Before the War the annual exports of cured herrings from Scotland rose to a total of 1,500,000 barrels, valued at about £2,000,000, while during the last three years the average has fallen to about 550,000 barrels, or one-third of the amount exported pre-War. The result has been that the fishermen have been unable to replace the annual wastage of nets, and many of the boats during the present year will be unable to put to sea unless the men are assisted in getting the necessary nets. In 1920 these men possessed a total of 313,000 nets, while in 1923 that number had fallen by 91,000 nets. The Committee will appreciate the parlous condition in which this has put the herring fishing industry to-day. In addition to this great shortage in nets, many of the nets which they still possess are 8 and 10 years old, and owing to the frequent tanning have shrunk so that they do not catch the larger and more valuable herrings, and these nets have become so hard and brittle that when a big catch is obtained the nets are unable to bear the strain, and in some cases the catch and the nets have thus been lost. Before the War the life of a net was considered to be four years, and it was the practice to discard nets as they lost their efficiency, about one quarter of the nets being renewed every year. Towards the end of 1923, and in the early days of 1924, the demand for herrings on the Continent began to revive, and there was an indication that the men
would he able to make up a little of the leeway which had been lost, but unfortunately, owing to the stormy weather experienced, the worn-out nets were unable to do their work properly, and frequently broke when herring catches were obtained, thus accentuating the poverty already existing in these fishing communities.
In addition to the pressure that has been put upon me by Members of Parliament from all parts of the House, as to the necessity for helping the fishermen to re-establish their industry, I have made close inquiry into this matter through the officials of the Fishery Board, and they are unanimously of the opinion that, unless the Government are prepared to come to the assistance of the fishermen, they will be unable to find the credits necessary for obtaining the nets required, and that many of the boats will he unable to get to sea this year as a consequence. This would be a great calamity, as there is every indication that the former markets for cured herrings on the Continent are again opening up, and there is a keen demand, which I am certain every Member of this House would like to see the fishermen put in the position of meeting. The Government have examined the position carefully and closely, looking to, the importance of preserving this valuable industry and community—and I believe that every Member of the Committee will agree with me in saying that these fishing communities are of the greatest value to the country. In addition, the Fishery Board for Scotland have had the situation under very close review, and their information supports the contention that, unless we come to their help, a serious emergency is, likely to arise in this industry. In these circumstances the Government have decided that a case for assistance as a nonrecurring emergency measure has been made out.
As to the form of the assistance, it is to be by way of loan and not of grant. The loan to any fishermen is to be on the basis of 50 per cent. of the cost of the nets, save in certain exceptional circumstances, to which I will briefly refer later on. Loans are to be confined to fishermen who can satisfy the Fishery Board that they are unable to purchase the drift nets from their own resources and that they will not be in a position to take an active
part in the ensuing fishing. I may say that the fact that we are dealing with working fishermen running their own vessels and nets on a co-operative system has had great weight with me so far as this matter is concerned, and as soon as the emergency is over it is my intention to make an effort to extend the co-operative basis. I fully intend to discuss with the men involved extending the principles of co-operation beyond the small family group which at present exists, so as to apply the principles of co-operation more widely, as I am of the opinion that by doing so we would put these men in the position of being able to overcome more easily the exceptional circumstances, such as they are passing through, which may arise in the future.
I wish to make clear one further point about these loan facilities. They are intended for the working herring fishermen, and they will not be available in any case where nets are provided by limited liability companies or other owners not engaged in the actual working of the nets.

Mr. T. JOHNSTON: What interest are you charging?

Mr. ADAMSON: Five per cent. Coming now to more detailed matters, perhaps, without attempting to be exhaustive, I may briefly outline some of the other terms and conditions of the scheme proposed to be adopted. The number of nets in respect of which loans may be made will not exceed 10 in any individual case. The loan will be restricted to one half of the cost of the nets. I said a little earlier that there was an exception to this, and that exception is that there are a number of younger men, who, in ordinary course, would have acquired a complete outfit of drift nets, but have been unable to do so owing to being absent on war service or because of the recent circumstances of the industry. In their case, the amount of the loan will be three-fourths of the cost of the nets, and such men will receive a preference in dealing with applications. Applicants must be prepared to answer any inquiries bearing on their declaration that they are unable to purchase the nets from their own resources. On the approval of an application and receipt of the applicant's cash payment to account, the order for the nets will be placed by the Fishery Board through the ordinary trade
channels. Such loans will be repaid in full within a period not exceeding 3 years from the date of the advance, with interest at 5 per cent., and subject to the right of the Fishery Board to demand repayment in full with accrued interest at any time.

Major Sir ARCHIBALD SINCLAIR: At any time after three years?

Mr. ADAMSON: At any time if that course is considered necessary by the Fishery Board. Under the share system there is a settlement for each vessel at the close of each fishing season. Without prejudice to the other conditions as to repayment, the borrower will be required to pay to the Board at each settlement an instalment of not less than 20 per cent. of the net sum accruing to him in respect of his share of the fishing gear, with accrued interest on the loan. These proposals will be put into operation as soon as this Supplementary Estimate has been passed. The sum of £150,000 will enable about 50,000 nets to be supplied.

Mr. FOOT: What profit do the Government intend to make out of this?

Mr. ADAMSON: As I have said already, 50,000 nets will be supplied during the next few months, at the rate of 10 nets per man, which will provide for at least 5,000 fishermen. On the important question of price, I am advised by the Fishery Board it is anticipated that the nets will be forthcoming at a reasonable price not in excess of the current rate. I hope this will he the case, and I think it right to say that, in the contrary event of unreasonable prices being charged, it will be necessary for me to consider the question of suspending the making of loans. I am sure that the Committee will recognise the great service these men have done to the community. The men of the fishing villages have built up an industry which is probably unique, in respect that their great fleet of drifters has been provided and equipped by their own efforts, and is worked upon the share system by the fishermen themselves. The word of such men is their bond, and I am confident that they may be relied upon to meet fully their obligation. I am sure the Committee will recognise the necessity for maintaining such an excellent, deserving and useful body of men, and of lending them the assistance required to enable them to restore their industry to a state of prosperity. I hope that the Com-
mittee may see their way to give me the Supplementary Estimate which I am asking in order to accomplish the object I have in view.

Mr. T. JOHNSTON: Before the right hon. Gentleman sits down, will he explain one point? He said that he was going to provide 50,000 nets, but he said in a previous part of his speech that the reduction in nets had been 91,000. Are we to understand that this loan is only going to provide nets for half the shortage between 1920 and 1923?

Mr. ADAMSON: In reply to the question put by my hon. Friend, let me say that I believe the amount we are providing for in this Estimate is as much as the net factories of the country would be able to undertake satisfactorily for some considerable time ahead.

Mr. F. MARTIN: As one of the Members representing the herring industry in Scotland, I should like to thank the right hon. Gentleman for the statement he has just made. It is quite true, as he says, that the fishery representatives have exercised considerable pressure upon him since he came into office, and I am very glad to realise that he has been able to transfer a considerable amount of that pressure to the Treasury, with, I think, a very satisfactory result. It is something over a year since certain Members in this House raised this question, and during the time that has elapsed since then the condition of the herring fishermen has not very materially improved. I am sorry to say we had no success at all with the right hon. Gentleman's successors, except that we had a somewhat indefinite promise of support from the last Government if the fishermen would form themselves into cooperative societies, so that there is nothing very startlingly new in the idea. Those who know the herring fishery are persuaded that the co-operation which already exists among fishermen, although it may centre round the family unit, is the best kind of co-operation, and suits them best, and is most likely to prove successful in their case.
At this moment, without having had time to consider, it is difficult to express a definite opinion as to the financial provisions of this Estimate. I am inclined to think at the moment that the conditions may be rather onerous in respect of the short time that is to be allowed
for the repayment of the loan I do hope that the Regulations under which the law is to be administered will be in the hands of the Fishery Board of Scotland. I am perfectly certain, and I am sure the right hon. Gentleman agrees with me, that it will give satisfaction if this be left with the Fishery Board, who understand this problem, and who will have a little more sympathy than the Treasury. If it be left to the Fishery Board, I think we shall all be satisfied. There are two classes of people whom we wish to help. There is, first of all, the fishermen who have suffered financial loss and actual loss of gear, not only on account of the hard times caused by the closing of the Continental markets, but, really and primarily, on account of the War itself, which took the men away from their peaceful occupations, and on coming back they found their gear deteriorated, The other class is the class mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman, the young men who have grown up during the War, and under conditions where it was impossible for them to accumulate capital in order to purchase nets and become fishermen as their fathers have done. The right hon. Gentleman announced that they are to receive a loan up to three-fourths of the cost of the nets, and I think they are to have more generous terms of repayment. I am not at all sure that the older men are not in a worse case than the young men, and I am not at all sure that they should not be treated on exactly equal terms; but, at all events, one is glad to know the right hon. Gentleman appreciates the difficulty under which the young men labour.
It is difficult, as I say, to do anything more than express very general approval of the scheme, but I do wish to express our gratitude, to the right hon. Gentleman. I think we know the right hon. Gentleman has had a very rough time in the past few weeks with certain Departments. At all events, it is an open secret among some Members that that is so. I am told that certain Members representing constituencies "furth" of Scotland are uneasy. We have always based our claim for the Scottish fishermen upon the fact that our men are share fishermen, that they are not the employés of syndicates, and it is of great importance that that race should be maintained. We think they are a very valuable race of people. I should like to say we hope very
much indeed that Members for fishing constituencies in England will support us on this occasion. It is only fair just to realise that we Scottish Members have worked long and hard to make this case, and we had a very good case to start with. I will say this: If any hon. Member on either side of the House, representing an English constituency, can bring so good a case before this House as we have brought, we, I am sure, will give that hon. Member every assistance to bring his Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries to a reasonable frame of mind.

Mrs. PHILIPSON: I should like to add my congratulations to those of the hon. Member for Aberdeen (Mr. F. Martin), and to assure him that I for one on this side of the House intend to give my support—and I hope other Members on this side of the House will join with me in giving support—to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Scotland in the proposal he is making on behalf of these fishermen. The right hon. Gentleman will remember that when this plea was put forward—and I congratulate him upon dealing so urgently and so promptly with that plea—a little while ago in this House, I said I hoped he would help all the fishermen who were going through hard and distressful times. I, therefore, would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he will shortly consider a scheme to help the English fishermen when there is a real need, and a real need can be shown just the same. I hope all Members on this side of the House will give the present proposal their support, because these fishermen certainly have a very deserving case.

Mr. T. JOHNSTON: I would like to add my commendations to the Secretary for Scotland for the way in which, in spite of very considerable discouragement and opposition, be has pushed through this scheme. I am not at all sure that he has not been compelled to introduce certain terms which the scheme would have been better without My own view is that some of the terms are rather harsh. I think the repayment in three years is a very stiff proposition. While I quite appreciate the idea that lies behind the provision that the right hon. Gentleman may call for the return of the loan in any given case at any given moment, and while I appreciate that he must reserve
to himself such power, I think he must admit that that is a power which must be exercised most carefully, and that there ought not to be held over these poor fellows the fear that they may be called upon at any moment to repay the loan. I hope he will not too urgently insist upon the 20 per cent. repayment Supposing there is a bad season; supposing prices are low, and these fishermen do not get sufficient, or barely sufficient, to provide themselves with the necessaries of life, does the right hon. Gentleman mean to say he is going to insist upon the 20 per cent. repayment of the loan? I hope he does not, and I am sure the House will support him if he will give himself greater latitude.
8.0 P.M.
There is only one further point. If I understood him rightly, he said he was going to provide 50,000 nets in the three years. Early in his speech the right hon. Gentleman said that between 1920–23 the reduction in the number of nets was no fewer than 91,000, so that it would appear that he is going to supply a little over half of that reduction. If I understand him aright, he said that 50,000 nets was the total productive capacity of the net factories in three years. If the net factories can produce more than 50,000, why does he limit the number of nets that he is prepared to grant to 50,000? How does he explain that? Outside these points, I am sure we will join very heartily in commending the right hon. Gentleman for the way the Government has come to the rescue of these fishermen, if in a somewhat tardy manner. As the last speaker but one pointed out, the race of fishermen is dying out, and unless the British Government comes to the help, the whole fishing community will disappear. I am very anxious that the right hon. Gentleman, having gone so far, will not tie his hands with these red tape Regulations which the Treasury have evidently put forward; that he, in conjunction with the Fishing Board of Scotland, will take a wider outlook, and go beyond the 20 per cent. that he has mentioned. I hope he will insist upon the matter being left to the discretion of the Fishery Board, so that it can take into consideration the various circumstances of the fishermen as humanely and sensibly as possible.

Sir CHARLES BARRIE: The. Secretary for Scotland has received congratu-
lations from all parts of the Committee for having succeeded in doing something for a really good cause. Nothing, however, has been said to the effect that his endeavours have been two-fold; that in the end he has worn down the opposition the Treasury were evidently bringing to bear upon him, and that he at last has succeeded in getting something for the herring fishers of Scotland. I am glad to note what my hon. Friend who spoke first said about our English friends. They, I am sure, realise that this is essentially a Scottish question, and they, in assisting us, should remember that the time may not be far distant when they, in their turn, may come for help in a similar good cause. For once the Minister of the Crown has taken the advice of a very good Department. I refer to the Fishery Board of Scotland, because this is a Department that has the full confidence of all the fishing representatives in this House. We know what exceedingly good work that Department has done for many years on behalf of the fishermen, led so well, as it is, by a very able chairman. I am hoping that in all matters affecting the fishermen of Scotland the right hon. Gentleman may always be willing to listen to what the Fishery Board of Scotland have to advise.
I was pleased to hear what the right hon. Gentleman said about this grant being given for the working fishermen, because the herring fishing industry is essentially one where the men themselves are the owners of the boats and the owners of the nets, and they make their own livelihood. They are entirely dependent upon their own efforts. I should like to add that, unlike some other trades, they are not anxious to get shorter hours—I do not refer to Members of Parliament, but other trades—and one has only got to be at the harbours when the herring are landed to see that these men put in not seven, eight or nine hours a day, but many more, and for a small pittance at that! The right hon. Gentleman will not do a better thing than he has done to-day in bringing before the House the need for this £150,000 as a loan to the fishermen to help them over their difficulty. I do not say that it will get them entirely over those difficulties, because they have arrears to make up. As the right hon. Gentleman so very well said, 91,000 nets have been lost in the
last three years; that in itself indicates the state that they are in. While it may be true that only 50,000 nets can be manufactured, nevertheless it is always something to the good and will enable the men, and especially the young men, to get a start in life. These are the young men who are so often urged, not only from this side of the House, but, I think, from all parts of the House, to make a start in life. Up till now some of them have not been able to do. It is a pitiful sight to see these young men willing to earn their own living and, through no fault of their own, unable to do so. This grant will now enable them to get a start. I hope that it may be the means of, getting them this start in life which will give them further help, get them heartened and amongst that class of people where we all desire to see them.

Mr. JAMES STUART: As the representative of a Scottish fishing constituency on this side of the House may I say how pleased I am that the Secretary for Scotland has taken this step. I cannot help feeling that the proposal put forward is hardly going to go far enough, because in the course of his remarks the right hon. Gentleman said that a serious emergency might arise if steps were not taken. I consider a serious emergency has already arisen. These herring fishermen are already very much in debt to those who have given advances, and I do not see how in many cases they will be able to get along; and they will have great difficulty in carrying out their contract under the terms of this Estimate. I think that the conditions laid down by the right hon. Gentleman this afternoon are extremely severe. I noticed that the hon. Member for Stirling (Mr. T. Johnston) inquired as to that. I agree with him thoroughly. This payment of 5 per cent. interest and repayment of principal within three years, or at any other time When the Fishery Board or the authorities may demand it, is going to make it extremely difficult for the fishermen to comply with. I am afraid that these Regulations may prove a great disappointmnet to some, if not a good many, fishermen who may find it very difficult to benefit by the scheme. I would ask the Secretary for Scotland to consider this matter again, if he can, very carefully and see if he cannot see some way to make the terms easier. We have had but a short time in which to consider the
matter. The actual Estimate does not give us the details which I wished to find, and we have just heard them from the right hon. Gentleman himself; therefore, I cannot help saying that these terms, I am afraid, are going to prove extremely severe.
There is one other point regarding the supply of nets. I gather from the right hon. Gentleman that the Department will purchase the nets themselves and will receive 50 per cent. in cash in such deserving cases as are approved. The men will be given the nets then at a reasonable price. I trust that the Secretary of State will not consider any scheme by which the nets will be purchased and supplied by the Department, because, in the opinion of many Members, there are those who are willing to supply nets at a very low, price for Government purchase, because they have had them on their hands for a long time. They may be given the name of new nets, but some of us are afraid that there will be a serious lack in their efficiency. The men should be allowed to purchase their own nets, because they know best what they want. I would also join with other hon. Members in asking those who represent English constituencies not to take exception to the present Vote, or if they have put forward opposition to withdraw it, because the Scottish case is an entirely different one to the English case. The Government are now taking steps towards remedying a wrong. I do not see how opposition can possibly be put forward, or help the English case, because two wrongs do not make a right.

Mr. DUNCAN MILLAR: There are two points I should like to put very shortly to the Secretary for Scotland. One is what is going to happen to the fisherman who is not in a position to put down any cash at the present time—and there are many such—in order to get the share of the Government loan? The right hon. Gentleman said that he would receive cash payments from the applicants. I would urge very strongly that if the scheme is to be successful, the case of a man who has no money, and requires aid, should be met, so that he may be in a position to take advantage of the help. The second point is this: Unless it is proceeded with immediately the scheme will fail. Will the right hon. Gentleman give us an undertaking that
the nets are going to he available within the next week or two if the men require them? Can he do so If so his scheme will prove a success, otherwise, I agree, it is rather dubious. I sincerely hope it will be carried through successfully.

Mr. ADAMSON: The various points which have been put forward by my hon. Friends will receive not only my consideration, but the consideration of the Fishery Board. I hope that the Committee will now give me the Vote.

Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.

Committee to sit again To-morrow.

EMPIRE SETTLEMENT.

Sir JOHN MARRIOTT: I beg to move,
That this House regrets that the rate of progress under the Empire Settlement Act, 1922, has been disappointingly slow, and urges the Government to do everything in their power to give the fullest possible. effect to the policy embodied in that Act.
I make no apology for bringing this subject before the attention of the House, for I am bringing it forward in no party spirit. It is not a party question, and I hope never will become a party question. I want to make it clear that the Motion I am proposing is not in any way intended as a criticism of His Majesty's present Government, still less of the Governments of the Dominions, least of all of the Department over which my hon. Friend the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department presides. I want to make that, quite clear from the outset, and if I use in my Motion the word "regrets" I am using it not in any way as implying a censure of the present administration.
My object is to bring a matter which I conceive to be of supreme and urgent importance before the attention of a House of Commons, nearly half of whose Members have come into the House since we put the Empire Settlement Act upon the Statute Book only two years ago. I am convinced that there is no problem more important, either from the point of view of the future of the British Commonwealth, or from the point of view of social and economic reform at home. I very deeply regret that the date for the moving of this Motion should have coincided with two important social functions, one to do honour to the oldest and
certainly one of the most respected Members of this House, and the other a function to which marry of us are bidden by Royal Command. Perhaps I may be allowed to say at this point that I hope the House will not think it disrespectful to them, and my hon. Friend the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Deparment will not think it disrespectful to him, if I have to leave the House to obey that Command very shortly after I sit down.
My Motion asks the House to express disappointment at the slow progress which has been made with the solution of a problem towards which we hoped the Empire Settlement Act might make a very important contribution. What is this problem? I do not think one could find a better answer to that question than in the Report which has been recently published of a delegation which went out last year to Australia, and of which my hon. Friend the Member for the Forest of Dean (Mr. Wignall) was one of the most active and distinguished members. That Report put the problem in these words:
The problem of migration is a problem of economy, namely, how best to distribute the population of our common Empire for the benefit of the whole.
It certainly will not, because it cannot, be denied that the present population of the Empire is most unevenly and un-economically distributed. I would beg the House to contemplate for a few moments the root facts of the economic situation. Here at home you have got a vast population planted on a tiny island, while in the South Seas you have a tiny population almost lost in the vast spaces of a continent. Here you have a population of 43,000,000 people planted on 88,500 square, miles, or taking the whole of Great Britain, 480 people to the square mile, while in England alone the figure is over 700. Out in Canada you have a population of something over, and in Australia
under, two per square mile. In England there is hardly room to move, while Canada and Australia are empty as a drum. Australia with an area of 33 times and more the area of this country has one-eighth of our population.
Then there is another question. The homeland cannot possibly feed from native resources the population which it carries. I know people talk about the intensive cultivation of the Boil and so forth. I do not underrate the importance of intensive cultivation, but
let the House consider this arithmetical fact. If you were to cultivate every inch of ground in Great Britain, if you were to reclaim your deer forests and clear your cities of every scrap of buildings, it would give you, per head of the population, 1⅓ acres. It is generally recognised that in order to be self-supporting, or anything like self-supporting, in respect of food supplies, you want about 3 acres per head of the population, and you want not more than 200 people to the square mile or 200 people to 640 acres. France, which is approximately self-supporting, has about 3 acres per head of population. I start then from this root fact. Here in the Homeland you have got what is at the present moment a superabundant population, a population which you cannot feed from home resources, except at a prohibitive price, even if at any price at all.
In the second place, of this superabundant population, you have at present more than 1,000,000 unemployed, and that unemployment, I submit, is very largely due to the stoppage of migration during the War years and the years which immediately succeeded the War. That stoppage, is perfectly intelligible. During those years, 1914–20, the outside aggregate emigration was 340,000 persons, whereas, on the basis of the five years preceding the War, that emigration ought to have aggregated 2,100,000. Even if you allow for immigration, the deficiency in emigration at the present time is well over 1,000,000 persons. But that is not all. The deficiency of 1,000,000 emigrants from this country means a deficiency, roughly speaking, of 1,000,000 settlers in the Dominions. Stated economically, the proposition comes to this. You have here in the Homeland a glut of non-pro-
ducing consumers. [HoN. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear!"] I perfectly appreciate the meaning of those ironical cheers, but I am stating a simple fact. Hon. Members can put what interpretation they please upon it. You have over 1,000,000 people unemployed here in this country, who are consumers and are not producers. On the other hand, you have in the Dominions a deficit of producers, who would also be potential consumers.
Imagine for one moment these 1,000,000 people transferred to Australia who are at present unemployed here—though I am not dealing with this problem primarily, and certainly not exclusively, from the point of view of unemployment;
that is incidental, but it is not the whole case by any means. Just imagine for one moment these 1,000,000 people transferred to Australia. We should have saved in this country at least £100,000,000 a year in unemployment relief, of which, probably, not less than one-half represents the price of imported foodstuffs for the maintenance of those 1,000,000 people. On the other hand, in Australia they would become consumers of English produce and English manufactures, certainly to, the extent of not less than £10,000,000 a year. That brings me to my next point. For us here at home this problem of Empire migration is not merely one of the better distribution of population. It is also a question of markets for our produce. I do not need to emphasise the obvious by insisting on the truth that, if we are to raise, as we all ardently desire to raise, the standard of comfort among the mass of our people, by far the best way of doing it is to stimulate the export trade of this country, and for this simple reason. To send out ships in ballast, or partly in ballast, means, as we have lately learned by painful experience, doubling the price of every imported commodity that we require. Every ton of freight that can be added to the cargo of an outgoing ship means a pro rata reduction of price on every ton brought back. To export cotton goods, steel rails, tinplates, or whatever you like, means to reduce the price of food to every household in our land.
Of course, these are elementary truths, and I apologise to the House for impressing them upon it; but I suggest that the best direction in which our export trade can be turned is in the direction of our own Dominions. I do not want to introduce into this Debate, so far as I can avoid it, one single controversial note, and I do not, therefore, propose to discuss the question of Imperial Preference, but I should be lacking in candour if I did not, at any rate, express, in passing, my own opinion that that question is very intimately, if not inextricably, bound op with this problem of Empire settlement. But there are certain facts, whatever inference you may choose to place upon them, which are beyond the region of dispute, and of those facts the most striking is that our own kinsmen overseas are incomparably our best customers to-day.
The Secretary to the Department of Overseas Trade was courteous enough to furnish me this afternoon with the latest figures on that subject, and they are extraordinarly striking. We have Canada taking, of English produce and manufactures, no less than £27,452,000 worth in the year ending 31st March, 1924—all my figures are for that period. That was just ld. under £3 per head of her population. The Union of South Africa took, of British produce and manufactures, £29,300,000 worth, or £4 3s. ld. per head of her population. Australia took £56,336,000 worth, or £9 18s. ld. per head of her population. I ask the House merely to make afresh the arithmetical calculation which I gave to them just now, and to imagine what the transference of 1,000,000 people from this country to Australia would mean in demand for English commodities. New Zealand, which is at the top of the list as regards per capitá consumption, took, with her tiny population, £20,028,000 worth of English goods, or £15 ls. 10d. per head of her population. Let us just compare those figures with the figures for our best foreign customers. Let us compare Australia, taking £56,336,000 worth of English goods, with the United States, which, with its 110,000,000 of population, takes £57,563,000, or 10s. 5d. per head of its population, as against £9 18s. ld. per head of the Australian population, or £15 ls. 10d. per head in New Zealand There is another comparison which is still more striking. After all, it is only an invisible frontier which divides the United States from Canada. The economic conditions are very similar, and, indeed, almost identical in parts, and yet, on one side of that invisible line, you have people taking, per head of the population, 10s. 5d. worth of English goods, while on the other side of that invisible line they take no less than £3 worth per head of the population. And then some people ask us to believe that there is no truth in the aphorism that trade follows the flag.
Perhaps I have said enough from the point of view of the Homeland. Let me turn for a moment to look at this matter from the point of view of one, at least, of our great Dominions; and if I speak more particularly to-night of Australia, it is because we have this Report so lately in our hands, and because it affords the most striking illustration of the truths
which I want to enforce. Regarding the matter from the standpoint of the Dominions, there are two points of view. There is the point of view of economic development, and there is also the not less important point of view of security and defence. I expect that there are a great many Members of this House, even if they are not present here tonight, who heard, as I heard, two or three years ago, a very remarkable lecture in the rooms of the Empire Parliamentary Association, from the then Prime Minister of Australia, Mr. Hughes. Since then we have heard many addresses, in those rooms and elsewhere, from distinguished statesmen from that great Dominion of Australia, and, to whatever party those statesmen have belonged, whether the Labour party or any other party, they have one and all borne concurrent testimony to one great fact, and that is, that people of all parties in Australia agree that that great Continent shall remain a great White Continent, and that, as far as possible, it shall carry only British stock. That is a sentiment which I regard as admirable, and which most people will applaud. But do not let is ignore this truth—it would be sheer affectation to ignore it—that if that be the ambition of Australia, there is only one way of attaining it.Many hon.Members will recall the words which Lord Northcliffe, at their invitation, addressed to the Australians as he was leaving them
on his world voyage. He said:
The key to your white Australia ideal is population. You must increase your slender garrison by the multiplication of your people. Only numbers will save you. The world will not tolerate an empty Australia. This continent must carry [...]ts full quota of population. You have no option. Tens of millions will come to you whether you wish it or not. You cannot hold up the human flood by a restriction Clause in an Act of Parliament.
We all know where Lord Northcliffe was looking for one of the sources of that human flood. I do not want to say one word that could irritate a single soul, but we have to remember that the economic situation of Japan is one not very unlike our own. In their small island, or series of islands, for I am including in this estimate Korea, Formosa, and Saghalien, they have 77,000,000 people on 260,000 square miles. You have in Japan very nearly double the number of people per square mile that you have in France. You have 320 to the square mile in Japan,
and 187 in France. It is double the density of Scotland. For Japan it is an absolute necessity to find an outlet for her surplus population and a market for her surplus goods. Where is she going to look for them? I leave that point with that hint, which I do not want to develop, but I suggest that to Australia at present there are two things which are absolutely essential. One is men, and the other is capital. At the moment, owing partly to trade depression and partly to other [...]cumstances, we in this country have a superabundance of both. From an economic point of view it is urgently necessary, in order that the Dominions may take advantage of the illimitable natural resources they command, that they should have more men. For lack of labour a very large proportion of their great areas is profitless to themselves and profitless to the world. We all know that the cost of living in these new countries is very high, and I suggest that there is no chance of a reduction of it until they can get a more abundant supply of what they want from outside. Their ability to get more from outside depends largely on the abundance which they themselves can export. I suggest then that the interests of the homeland and the interests of the Dominions are, in these economic respects, absolutely mutual and complementary.
I pass from that to consider what has been done to promote these interests and to solve the problem which I have proposed to the House. In 1913 the total outward movement of population from this country was 389.394 people, of whom 285,046 went to portions of the British Empire. Canada took 190,000, Australia 56,000, New Zealand 14,000, and South Africa 11,000. In 1923 the outward flow had fallen from 390,000 to 256,284, of whom the British Empire took 157,062. Those are the facts from which we start. What has been done by our own Government? In 1917 a Committee was set up, under the Chairmanship of Lord Tennyson, known as the Tennyson Committee, to explore the possibilities of overseas settlement for ex-service men, and after the Armistice Lord Long, who was then at the Colonial Office, set up a Government Emigration Committee, which is now transformed into the Oversea Settlement Committee. Its first task was to devise a scheme for the settlement of ex-service men. It was not a
very easy problem, because to have sent ex-service men to the Dominions without an assurance of employment would have been not only futile but cruel The men themselves had to be sound in body and character as well as adapted to the only occupation which was in practice open. Plainly the only safe policy was to leave the task of selection to the representatives of the Overseas Government, and that was done. The Imperial Government undertook to provide a free passage for approved and selected ex-service men and their families to any part of the British Empire. No voucher for a free voyage was issued except upon the express recommendation of the Dominion representatives. Altogether, think some 50,000 ex-service men, making with their families about 100.000 persons, received free passages under that scheme, and have established themselves under the British flag overseas. Perhaps the number would have been larger if some of the Dominion Governments had not practically confined the selection to men willing to go on the land or women prepared to enter domestic service. In all, perhaps some 100,000 people were migrated under that scheme. The whole expense of that scheme, naturally and properly, fell on the Imperial Government. That experiment is now closed, but I am glad to say that, as far as we have information—on this point I hope my hon. Friend the Member for the Forest of Dean (Mr. Wignall) will he able to give the House some very recent first-hand information—in the Report of the delegation of which he was a member, that the great majority of these ex-service men whom the delegation saw were confident of success. That is good news for Members of this House. That experiment; was on a comparatively small scale, and was intended to meet a specific emergency.
A little later, in 1922, mainly through the vigorous advocacy of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook (Mr. Amery) this House placed on the Statute Book the Empire Settlement Act. That Act was the outcome of two conferences in the year 1921, between leading statesmen of this country and the Dominions. One of the conferences, held by the Prime Ministers of the Empire, decided to advocate co-operation in a comprehensive policy of land settlement and Empire-
directed migration between the Imperial Government and the Government of those oversea parts of the Empire that were suitable for settlement by people from this country. That recommendation was embodied in the Empire Settlement Act which received the Royal Assent on the 31st May, 1922.
That Act empowers the Secretary of State, who acts on the advice of the Over-sea Settlement Committee, to co-operate with the Dominion Governments or with public authorities or public or private organisations, including such organisations as the Church Army, the Salvation Army and Dr. Barnardo's Homes, either here or overseas, in carrying out agreed schemes for joint assistance of suitable persons in this country who wish to settle overseas. These agreed schemes might be either development schemes or land settlement schemes or schemes for assisting with passage money, and allowances for training or otherwise, suitable persons from this country. The financial liability of the Home Government was limited to £1,500,000 for the first year and to £3,000,000 a year for the 14 subsequent years.
Although the period was limited to 15 years in the Act, the machinery of the Act, I am glad to say, is designed to be permanent. The Dominions agreed to contribute, pound for pound, for such portion of the sum voted by this House as was spent on assisted emigration. This was estimated to cost about £1,000,000 a year, so that with the Dominion contribution a total of £2,000.000 a year was available for assisted passages. It was calculated that that ought to be sufficient to provide the preliminary training, passage and landing money for 60,000 to 80,000 settlers a year. In the case of adults, not more than one -third of the passage money was to be a free grant, though another third. or even two-thirds, might be advanced in special cases on loan. It. was held, further. that as the scheme got fully under way, and if the repayments of advances were added to the funds available for assisted migration, the number of settlers would considerably exceed 80,000 a year.
No time was lost in framing agreements under the Act. Passage agreements were concluded with Australia and New Zealand, and with the Government of Ontario, and as regards certain classes
of emigrants with the Government of the Dominion of Canada. Important agreements for land settlement have also been arranged with three of the Australian States—West Australia, Victoria and New South. Wales, and a number of minor schemes have been initiated in cooperation with such bodies as the Salvation Army and the Church Army. What are the aggregate results? We have now had nearly two years of working. The following figures were supplied to me the other day in this House by the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department. The total number—we were anticipating 80,000 a year—of people who have gone out in the period of nearly two years amounts to 55,036, of whom 38,779 have gone to Australia, 8,287 to New Zealand, 7,957 to Canada and 13 to South Africa. The total expenditure of the Imperial Government, which by this time might have amounted under the Act to £4,500,000, has been less than £500,000—£460,100. A considerable portion of the total expenditure represents loans recoverable over varying periods.
I hope the House will agree that I was justified in putting down a Motion that the rate of progress has been disappointingly slow. I hope my hon. Friend the Member for North Islington (Sir H. Cowan) will go more fully into the reasons which have retarded the success of the scheme. If hon. Members care to look into the matter, they will find many of these reasons admirably set forth in the Report of the Overseas Settlement Committee, Command Paper 2107. The reasons, I will not say for the failure, but for the relative failure of the scheme, are partly economic. As the Report says, rather paradoxically, periods of bad trade, trade depression, are less favourable to migration than periods of prosperity. They say:
Experience shows that the figures of migration and settlement are higher at times of trade prosperity and lower in times of trade depression.
Since the Act came into operation, we have been passing through a period of very severe trade depression. Of course, large expenditure is necessary, and nobody is going to make large expenditure until they are reasonably certain of the markets to which produce can be sent. There are other reasons, partly political, about which If do not want to enlarge, and others partly personal
and psychological. Towards the end of the 18th century, Adam Smith made a remark that man is, of all kinds of baggage, the most difficult to transport. He was thinking of other things. He was thinking of the operations of the Poor Law and so on, but his remark is still true. Something might be done to over come this human vis inertiæ, if I may so speak of it, by group settlement.
We ought, if possible, to try to extend the principle of what is technically known as collective nomination. Under this arrangement, which has been tried in Australia upon a small scale in the past, nominations were made, not by individuals, but by churches, philanthropic societies and other organisations overseas in favour of persons to be selected by kindred churches, kindred societies or kindred organisations in this country. In this matter we might take a hint from the history of our earliest English settlements in North America. They were all on the group system, and as the strongest of the ties of that clay was the tie of community of religious faith the groups were based upon that principle. Thus you had the Puritan group in New England, the Roman Catholic group in Maryland, the Anglicans in Virginia and the Quakers in Pensylvania, New Jersey and so forth.
Would it not be possible to apply the same principle, though not on the same lines, to group settlement in the Dominions to-day? You might have county settlements. We have got, I think, an association of the men of Kent for the purpose, and I rather think that there is an association in Devon and Cornwall. You might have Old Boys' Schools settlements, and you might have college settlements. That is my first practical suggestion—that you should develop this collective group family scheme of settlement. My second very earnest suggestion is: Do let us take some real trouble and thought about the settlement, of children and adolescents in the Dominions. I do not know whether Members of this House remarked a letter in the "Times" a day or two ago from Dr. Laurie, of Edinburgh, in which he said:
The mother ship is loaded over the Plimsoll line with a valuable cargo of youth for which the Dominions are calling.
We are at present turning out every year from our elementary schools 550,000
children. I suppose that the total output of the schools of all classes is about 800,000 a year poured into a congested I about market. Our Dominions are calling for boys and girls. The appeal of Dr. Laurie is endorsed in the "Times" of to-day by Commissioner Lamb of the Salvation Army. The Dominions are calling for boys and girls. These are the only human commodities for which the Dominions can be said to be calling, except women ready to undertake domestic service, but, as the late Parliamentary Secretary of the Overseas Committee said, I put juveniles first. So do the Dominions. So does the Prince of Wales, who, speaking at a dinner of the Child Workers' Society the other day, said what will be endorsed from every quarter of this House, that of all forms of waste the saddest is the waste of child life. He speaks from experience in these matters, and he went on to say,
My experience is that the younger the people who go out overseas the easier it is for them to settle down to the new life and the new conditions.
I do not think that anyone speaking in this House ought to touch this subject of child and adolescent migration without paying a tribute to the wonderful work which has been done in this connection by the Salvation Army, the Church Army, Dr. Barnardo's Homes and, not least—

Mr. B. SMITH: By the Primrose League.

9.0 P.M.

Sir J. MARRIOTT: That is a very stupid observation. I was speaking seriously, and was paying a tribute to the societies which have been doing a great national work and, not least, I was about to add, to the foundation of a young Oxford Rhodes scholar, Kingsley Fairbridge. The school which he started in Western Australia is now providing for about 200 boys and girls, the object being, as he put it in a telegram the other day, to present the waste of population under the Union Jack. I am confident that this work deserves the encomiums which have been passed upon it by the delegation of which the hon. Member for the Forest of Dean was a member, hut it is only on a comparatively small scale. On a larger scale you have the Dreadnought scheme in New South Wales, under which
2,500 boys are to be taken out and trained in farm work. That scheme is absorbing boys to-day at the rate of 60 a month.
You have in South Australia the scheme which takes its name from the Premier, Sir Henry Barwell. They are looking for six thousand boys under that scheme and they are at present absorbing 50 a month. A similar scheme was started in New Zealand some time ago providing for the absorption of 100 a month. All these schemes promise to absorb about 2,500 boys a year. My hon. Friends opposite expressed themselves as greatly impressed by what they saw of the working of these training and apprenticeship schemes. There have been a few failures, but I believe that out of 2,000 boys sent out under these schemes only 12 complaints have been received, which is a very remarkable testimony both to the care with which the boys are selected and the care with which they are supervised after they reach the Dominions, and supervision is very necessary.
Next, I want to urge the House to give a little thought and trouble to the migration of women. Here we have a concrete illustration of the general truth which I have been trying to impress as to the mal-distribution of population. We have a surplus of 2,000,000 women in this country, while in the Dominions they have a serious deficiency. In Canada, for example, they have an excess of 271,000 men, in Australia an excess of 88,000 men, in South Africa an excess of 44,000 men, and in New Zealand an excess of 27,000 men. In all, there is an excess of about half a million men in those four Dominions alone. We want to correct that excess. Family settlement seems to show us the lines on which we should proceed. Finally, I would suggest, particularly to my right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook, to whose good work in this connection I desire to pay a tribute, that the time has come when we ought to consider whether we should not attempt to amend the Empire Settlement Act, and to amend it in such a way as to permit greater latitude in the manner of expenditure. I do not think that we need ask, or should ask, for more money. We cannot spend the money which we have got. We do want, I think, a little more freedom as to the way of spending
it. In this respect I think that there has been a great change of opinion since we rather timidly, perhaps, put that Act on the Statute Book now just two years ago.
I have detained the House I am afraid at quite unwarrantable length, and I must apologise, but I would conclude with a very respectful but earnest appeal to His Majesty's Government, not more to the Government than to the House of Commons, and above all to the individual Members of this House of Commons, to do everything which in them lies to promote all sound schemes for the readjustment of our population, and especially the scheme which is embodied in the Empire Settlement Act. I am more profoundly convinced than I can convey to the House that there is no scheme of social reform so promising on which we can lay our hands. Day after day, week after week, and month after month, we have been discussing the problems of unemployment and housing. The urgency of those problems I would be the last person to question. The solution of them is vital to the well-being of our people. But may it not be that we are, perhaps, seeking to apply palliatives to symptoms when we ought to be penetrating to the root causes of the disease? Some of those root causes I have attempted to lay bare to-night. I have also indicated what I believe to be the real remedy, the only remedy, which is at once real and radical.
Perhaps at this critical moment in the destinies of our race we are in some little danger of taking the wrong turning We are impressed with the idea—I do not say too strongly impressed—of overpopulation, and there is a good deal of talk, in consequence, of an artificial limitation of the birth-rate. I want to see not fewer British people in the world, hut more. My own conviction is unshaken that there is no such good stock as that, and that the future of the world, humanly speaking, depends not on its diminution, but on its increase. But I do want to see that population better distributed throughout the Empire as a whole. That is the whole sum and substance of all the disjointed observations which I have inflicted on the House tonight. Surely the moment is peculiarly opportune for the appeal which I make to the House. It is only three days ago that the whole nation, nay, the whole Empire, from the King-Emperor down-
wards, joined in a solemn service of thanksgiving and dedication. That service was, in truth—if I may borrow the wards of a particularly fine article in the "Times" of Monday last—
an Imperial consecration of all good that the Empire has done, and of all good that it proposes to do and that it may do, to Him in whose sight a thousand years are but as yesterday and nations are as the small dust of the balance.
Those are noble words, inspired by a lofty faith. In my Motion I ask the Government and the House and the country to give to that faith substance, and to translate those words into effective works.

Sir HENRY COWAN: I beg to second the Motion.
I propose to respond to my hon. Friend's suggestion by endeavouring to indicate to the House some of the reasons why the rate of progress under the Empire Settlement Act, 1922, has been so disappointingly slow. I approach this matter not as a hostile critic. If I must approach it as a critic, I approach it as a friendly critic, for I regard the Empire Settlement Act as one of the greatest achievements of the Parliament in whose lifetime it was passed, and I think that special credit and honour are due to the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook (Mr. Amery), who as Chairman of the Over-sea Settlement Committee piloted that Bill through the House. My criticism is not of the Act; it is of the administration of the Act. I believe that it is in the machinery which has been set up for the administration of the Act that we may find the principal causes of the slow rate of progress of Empire Settlement. In the first place, I have always regarded the contribution of the Imperial Government, towards the cost of transferring population from the home country to the Dominions, as altogether inadequate. I believe that we can afford to be generous. The Chancellor of the Exchequer is not in his place at the moment, and he might possibly dissent from that view, though we all know how generous he is in a cause that appeals to him. I hope that this cause will appeal to him.
We are burdened with an overplus of population. We have an immensely congested population, 400 persons to the square mile, compared with less than two persons per square mile in the great Dominions. It is so vital to our interest
that we should reduce this excessive density of population, that we surely can afford to say to the Dominions which want population, "We will send you the people if you will provide for them when they reach you." I do not think that under the Empire Settlement Act we have been generous enough in our propositions to the Dominions. However that may be, the Empire Settlement Act has failed in its purpose to a large extent, as is shown by my hon. Friend's statement that out of £4,500,000 which might have been expended under the Act, so far less than £500,000 has been spent. The fact is that the administration of the Act has not been regarded from a business point of view. You cannot make any large undertaking progressive unless you advertise. There has been no aggressive publicity of the Empire Settlement Act; there has been no attempt to force it upon the attention even of our own people. The machinery by which it is operated is certainly very inadequate. I am aware that the Salvation Army, the Church Army, the Young Men's Christian Association, Dr. Barnardo's Homes, and many other voluntary institutions, have thrown themselves heart and soul into the movement and have done their best to ensure it success. But these organisations are not cut out for the job.
What is wanted is an ad hoc authority. I am aware of the strong objection that may be raised to that suggestion on the ground of expense. There is no doubt it is more economical to get the work done by these voluntary organisations which collect money from the public and receive nothing from the Exchequer. It is an economical mode of procedure, and if it were successful and efficient I should have nothing to say against it, but it is not successful or efficient. They have not got the settlers. I have had personal experience in this matter because within a few months of the passing of the Empire Settlement Act in 1922 I invited the Agent General of one of the great Australian States to visit my constituency in the North of Scotland, and I suggested that he should bring with him representatives of the Migration Department of the Commonwealth Government at Australia House. My friend accepted my invitation and toured my constituency. He and his associates of the Commonwealth Migration Department spoke in every large
centre of population in the constituency and in many of the small villages, with the result that a very considerable number of migrants flocked to the agents and pressed themselves forward for selection, and they were of the most excellent type. What struck me most at those meetings, apart from the enthusiasm and the very large gatherings which we had, was the utter ignorance of the people in regard to the Empire, the Settlement Act, the machinery of the scheme and everything connected with it. If they had heard of it at all it had scarcely aroused their curiosity.
That was a successful experiment, and I believe further recruiting campaigns on the same lines under similar auspices and conducted as ably as that one was would yield excellent results. While that is so, I have no doubt it is only one of the methods which. might be employed with equal or even greater success. That is one method which I employed myself, and I certainly found it successful from every point of view except perhaps one, and that is a purely personal point of view. A Member of this House who goes to his constituency and talks about migration is liable to be very seriously misrepresented, but that is a small personal matter, and it is a risk which we ought to take if we have the interests of our country at heart. Two years have passed since the Empire Settlement Act was placed on the. Statute Book, and what do we find? There is no widely diffused knowledge of the provisions of the Act even in London, and in the country it is hardly known at all. It is hardly realised that we have an Empire. What the Empire means to the people is not realised. People who are living on what we call the dole, who are only keeping body and soul together, who are for the most part willing and anxious to work, but unable to obtain work, who through our bitter cold winters suffer the severest privations in this impossible climate of ours, hardly realise that overseas, a few weeks' sail from our shores, there are these wonderful lands, rich in soil and in minerals, with perfect climates, lands in which, if a man works, he cannot fail to succeed. They do not know.
We do not advertise, the Empire. It is true we have the Exhibition at Wembley this year, which is a great advertisement for the Empire, but Wembley is in London, and there are-
hundreds of thousands of people who will never come to Wembley and who will soon grow tired of reading about it in the papers. They will learn nothing about the Empire, but will go on in their old miserable, ignorant way. I think it would be desirable if we could make it clear to them that the Empire is open to them; that going to Australia, Canada, New Zealand or South Africa is not a penalty but a privilege, is not a banishment but is only going from one province of the Empire to another. It is not much more difficult nowadays to go from London or the West of England to Canada than it was 50 years ago to go from London to the North of Scotland. What we want is systematic educational propaganda on a sufficiently large scale. We want to realise and to get other people to realise the magnitude of the problem. We want our people to understand that, in going to any of the Dominions, they are going to a land under their own flag, peopled by their own race, where their own language is spoken, and where their own religion is practised, or at any rate preached. In my view neither the home Government nor the Dominion Governments have done all that could reasonably be expeoted from them in this matter.
The hon. Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) has referred to the Report of the delegation of which the hon. Member for the Forest of Dean (Mr. Wigna.11) was a distinguished member. The delegation has reported that there is a certain hostility or, at any rate, a certain dislike on the part of organised labour in Australia in regard to the sending out from this country of skilled workers and artisans to go into the towns. It is feared that this might reduce not merely the price of labour and the standard of living, but might also, in exceptional circumstances, swell the present comparatively small sum total of unemployment. I understand, however, from the same Report, that there is no objection on the part of organised labour in the Dominions, certainly not in Australia, to the sending out of large numbers of land workers, provided we can give some reasonable guarantee that these will be well selected and will have some preliminary training in the elements of agriculture in this country, so that they may not be liable to drift into the towns and increase the labour problem there. I do not think we can regard organised labour
in Australia as hostile to well-regulated migration, provided it applies to settlement on the land.

Notice taken that 40 Members were not present; House counted; and 40 Members being present—

Sir H. COWAN: During the Session of 1922, and shortly after the passing of the Empire Settlement Act, I had the honour of organising a deputation to the then Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook. That deputation represented the Empire Parliamentary Committee, a non-official Committee of the House of Commons, consisting of more than 200 Members of the House. My right hon. Friend received the deputation with his invariable courtesy, and discussed very fully with it the machinery under which the Empire Settlement Act was intended to operate. We laid before him our views, and they were the views of 200 Members, in regard to the method of selecting emigrants, in regard to propaganda, in regard to publicity, and we ventured very respectfully, but I am afraid my right hon. Friend will say rather persistently, to urge that the Employment Exchanges should not find any part in the scheme. I do not say that the scheme we laid before the right hon. Gentleman was necessarily the best scheme. I am quite sure it will be open to many criticisms. I am equally sure that experience has shown that something much more thorough and far-reaching than the scheme which the right hon. Gentleman adopted is desirable if we are to make the Empire Settlement Act a piece of really effective Imperial machinery. I notice on referring to the Debates on the Second Reading of the Empire Settlement Bill that my right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook said:
I am not recommending this policy of Empire Settlement as a panacea for the immediate crisis of unemployment with which we are confronted.
But I find a little later the same right hon. Gentleman suggested that no more direct or more effective remedy for unemployment could be devised than a policy which would gradually rectify the abnormal distribution of population and convert those who were an unwilling burden on the community into producers who would be a source of wealth and strength alike to their new homes and the old ones. I do not think that anyone will
maintain that Empire migration on the modest scale contemplated by the Empire Settlement Act can ever be an effective remedy for unemployment. But I do think that the voluntary transfer of labour from this overcrowded country to our almost unpeopled Dominions would relieve a great deal of individual distress and enable many a man, woman and child with no prospects here to live happy, contented and useful lives in the Empire beyond the seas. Here of course arises a, very difficult question. It is naturally resented by a man to be told that he must go here or there. You cannot say to any citizen, whatever his position, or however destitute he may be: "You must transfer your labour overseas to some other part of the Empire." It is only in Russia they do that. We are a free people and do not attempt to dictate to the proletariat. While every man has a right to refuse to go, we may remind our citizens that they have an option over their share of our great Imperial inheritance, and it is for them to decide when they desire to take it up. Every man has that choice. I do not say it comes to every man more than once, but every man once in his lifetime has that opportunity thrust upon him. But he does not realise what it is or what it means. He does not understand what he is sacrificing by refusing.
That brings me back to my major proposition that the Empire is not known to British people, that the Empire Settlement Act means nothing to them. They are unacquainted with the provisions, which have been insufficiently advertised, and it is only by rubbing it in, preaching it, carrying on propaganda all over the country in season and out of season that we will get the people of this land to understand the riches awaiting them beyond the seas. If we could only do that, then so far from our having to deplore in future debates that we cannot get men to go to the Dominions, we would have so great a rush of men, women and children anxious and eager to go that it would tax all our resources and those of the Dominions to meet them.
The Empire Settlement Act has been said to be too ambitious, and it has been described as being too costly. It has not cast much. We might have spent £4,000,000, and we have not spent half a
million. This Act was all we could get at the time. Now, with two years' experience we must face the facts of this gigantic problem, and transfer the population within the Empire. It is no use talking in small figures. My hon. Friend the Member for York has spoken of what would be the result of transferring 1,000 000 unemployed persons from this country to Australia. It would be great. It would mean an enormous increase in purchases from Australia of our goods, and increased work for our people here. Our people are increasing at the rate of 600,000 a year. We have boldly to face a much bigger problem than that. We have to talk about millions, about inducing 5,000,000 people in the next 10 years to remove themselves for their own good and the good of their country to the Empire beyond the seas. The Report of the British Oversea Settlement Delegation states:
During the current year, there is a probability that some 50,000 Britishers will migrate to Australia.
It would take you 100 years at that rate to settle 5,000,000 in Australia, and all the time our population is increasing in this country at the rate of half a million a year. That is no solution. You have to do a big thing. You have to start a propaganda for removing millions of people in a comparatively short time.

Mr. NEIL MACLEAN: Are you going?

Sir H. COWAN: Some hon. Members may say to-night it is folly and absurdity, a wild cat scheme. It is nothing of the sort. If you wait a few years you will all be saying what I am saying to-night. Australia to-day takes £60,000,000 worth of our manufactures. Double the population of Australia by the simple process of transferring 5,000,000 of our people from this country there, and you will treble the consumption of our manufacturers, while you will eliminate unemployment in this country altogether.

Mr. MACLEAN: Do not they buy anything here?

Sir H. COWAN: MY reply to that interuption is that they cannot buy much when they are unemployed, and if within ten years we remove 5,000,000 people from this country to Australia, whether unemployed or not, we shall by so much relieve the amount of unemployment here
and increase the purchasing power of those who remain. People who are living on doles cannot spend much money in the shops. I remember a speech delivered at a private gathering in the House of Commons by the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook, when he used the phrase that the problem we have to face is the bringing of the man-power of the Empire into touch with the resources of the Empire. He pointed out that we had vast undeveloped resources overseas. We had a soil which would yield gigantic crops, and it only needed to put man-power there in order to reap those benefits. I venture to say without any hesitation that this solution of the problem would be for the benefit of the whole British Empire.

Dr. MACNAMARA: I should like to say a word or two in support of this Motion. I cordially agree with the Mover that it is not for us, and none of us have any shadow or desire, to attribute blame in any direction, neither here nor overseas. That would be impertinent, unjust and not helpful. I want to encourage and stimulate, and if I speak with warmth about it, and I do so, it is because I see a great vital and short-lived opportunity slipping away. I am greatly disappointed with the operations under the Empire Settlement Act. Let LIB be frank with each other. Most of us are half-hearted about it. Look at the state of these benches. They are nearly empty. Broadly speaking, I say we are halfhearted; some of us are rather hostile. I do not deny that the emigration methods of the past have often been such as to justify a deep-rooted prejudice in the minds of the people at each end of the line. They have had sent them untrained people—people physically unlit for the job in front of them. They have been shipped by interested persons and have been attracted largely by shipping prospectuses, to seek their fortunes oversea. Of course, many have failed and have drifted into the big cities of the oversea Dominions to swell the roll of unemployed there. That being so, can you wonder that in some cases the Dominions tell us that they do not want our unemployed.
The crux of Empire settlement is to put this thing, in conjunction with the Oversea, Dominions, on a new and better plane. Of course, people have long memories and prejudice will still prevail.
They will still bear in mind the emigration methods of the past. The Empire Settlement Act came into force on the 1st June, 1922. We authorised the expenditure of £1,500,000 in the financial year ending the 31st March, 1923, and we authorised the expenditure of £3,000,000 a year for each of the succeeding 14 years. Up to date we might have spent nearly £5,000,000, but the actual amount spent to the end of April last was only £561,492, and the total number of persons actually sent overseas was but 59,556—a deplorably meagre contribution to a vital and urgent social problem. We have here 650 people to the square mile. In Queensland—I am not taking extreme parts of the British Empire such as the Yukon—but in Southern Australia, in Western Australia and British Columbia there are less than two to the square mile and in Quebec and Manitoba less than three. Here to-day we have as many people at work as we had in 1914, but after all that we have a roll of a million unemployed. How we are going to absorb these people I do not know. Is it realised by the Oversea Dominions that our post-War unemployment problem is an entirely different one from our pre-War problem? Our unemployed to-day are young men mostly in their prime, sturdy, hardy and enduring, and those who suggest that they are of the same calibre as the pre-War unemployed do not know what they are talking about. They are under the greatest possible misapprehension. If these men were given an opening, I am perfectly certain they would make good use of their chances, as so many have done, but train them properly while there is an opportunity before the tide is lost, and then these men will become first-class pioneers, of that I am satisfied, in opening up the vacant spaces of the British Empire. Training is vital. It is no good taking these young fellows from the street corners of the great cities and expecting them to become at once agricultural workers. You have to give them an agricultural training, but unless we are careful we shall miss the tide, and they will become more and more unemployed and will prove more or less a charge on the public purse. It is now or never for these young men. Labour has said more than once—and I hope my hon. Friends above the Gangway will understand that
I am trying to meet their case—"Develop your own home resources." Well, develop them to your heart's content, but when you have done that, do you think you can absorb the population of these Islands? I do not think so. You have to do both, and I shall not be backward in trying to do the former, and I plead with you to give me a hand in trying to do the latter. Ask the Lord Privy Seal, whose fine speeches on this problem have always filled me with admiration—those plucky speeches—as to the necessity for this work of Empire settlement.
Why cannot we all tackle this problem in the sort of way in which we tackled the problems of the War? Why do not we group these young fellows together, give them agricultural training, in cooperation with the overseas Dominions—because everything must be done in cooperation with them—and send them out to form new communities? Let us have infantry training camps over again, this time with volunteers, this time with a new and happier objective. I see the future of these young fellows down two vastly divergent vistas. Here they are, 300,000 of them under 30 or in the early thirties, first-class material, the makings of fine citizenship. If they stay here—develop your own resources as much as you will—I am afraid that for two out of three of them there is nothing but steady failure and ultimate disaster, and marriage with some girl, despondent in the fact that she is bringing into the world wretched little scraps of humanity to be reared amongst the squalor and misery of our East End rookeries. That is one vista. I see the other vista, for two out of three of them, health, and strength, and vigour, and success, in the open spaces of the British Empire, and a helpmeet happy that she is bringing into the world hardy, sturdy youngsters, on the broad open countryside and in God's good fresh air. Let us get on, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, let us get on!

Mr. SNELL: The chief thing about to-night's Debate seems to be that so very important a question, on which we are told that the very existence of our Empire may depend, has drawn so little attention from Members of this House. We, on this side, are not supposed to be keen about emigration and, therefore, are not expected to regard this Debate as of
supreme importance. But what I desire to draw the attention of the House to is this fact, that in the long speech of the introducer of this Motion not one word was said by him in regard to emigration as being a remedy for unemployment troubles. Neither was there one single word from him or from the Seconder of the Motion about the rights of our people to have a home in their own land. We have heard a. very great deal to-night about the British Empire being one country, and that people should be moved about it just for the convenience of other people, but not one word has been uttered as to the right of these men and women, born on this soil, to have a. right to the home in which they were born.

Sir H. COWAN: I am sure the hon. Gentleman does not wish to misrepresent what I said, but I expressly stated that no one ought to be moved about from one part of the Empire to another for the convenience, or at the wish, of anybody but themselves. I think everybody has the right to decide for himself, and no man should be obliged to go. I said that that was the Russian method, and not the British.

Mr. SNELL: Of course, my last desire is to misrepresent, but as I have paid attention to this Debate, the singular thing that struck me was that complete disregard was paid to the natural feelings of these people who have to be moved from here to the ends of the world. I should also be the last person to try to put any sort of barrier in the way of a young man's desire to go to another part of the Empire or the world if, by so doing, he could better the position in which he finds himself, for I agree with what has been said, that we have to take a long view of the situation in which we are placed. I find myself, among the pessimists in regard to our industrial and economic outlook, and I see no chance whatever of our surplus population, as we call it, being absorbed into industry as quickly as I and other Members of this House would desire. It may be, therefore, that we have to consider another way of relieving the situation. I personally regard emigration, taken alone, as one of the great delusions if it is meant to be a remedy for this position in which we find ourselves. But we must also understand that, however quickly we may operate—and in this House we do not operate quickly—months and years
will go by before we can reorganise our society so that all our people will find their place in industry and return to prosperity. I want, therefore, to ask whether this emigration proposal, put forward with so much certainty, is the real remedy to which we must look. It seems to me to be a ready-made expedient. There is no creative thought in regard to it. It is good as far as it goes, but it is one of those alluring things which make people believe that it alone is the solution of the whole problem. It seems to me that if we promote our emigration proposals as quickly as we may, we shall never overtake the problem by which we are faced in this respect, and there is, too, the fact that by the export of the best of our blood, the most virile of our population, we are devitalising, as it were, the most vital elements of our civilisation.
I, personally, believe that as a home remedy, as a remedy for our home affairs, there is very little, indeed, in this emigration proposal, and there is, in promoting it, a very considerable danger that we may be led to neglect other things. Therefore I want to associate myself with what was said by my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Camberwell (Dr. Macnamara), namely, that we have to take both these things together and not neglect either of them for the, sake of the other. To put all our strength upon emigration, while neglecting the reorganisation of our own land, is to me not wise statesmanship, it is bad eugenics, and it is an altogether inadequate remedy. Before our day, the doctors used, if a person was sick, to bleed him and make him weak. If he was very weak, they used to bleed him and make him still more weak. It seems to me that, when we are in trouble, the emigration solution is to take more of our best blood out of our community. That is to bleed our nation in a very sorry way. So I would say that we must look in this matter, not to emigration alone, but to home re-organisation. That is our main responsibility. I believe there are good acres waiting to be tilled. It does not mean that because farming in this country has not succeeded, it never will succeed. Land may not be able to pay three profits, the profit to the landlord the profit to the farmer, and wages to the worker. But the land would pay the worker himself.
If it would give food to him and his family, provide a roof to him and his children as a result of the toil he put into it, then that land ought to be available to him for the service he gives. I do not agree that our climate is an impossible one. We have the best land and the best climate in many respects for farming in the world. I have worked as an agricultural labourer on its soil, and I know of what it is capable, if men can get access to the land, if they can put their strength into it, if they can get freedom from the embarrassment of its old traditional laws.
We must look at this emigration, therefore, from a different point of view, if we are to commend it at all. I cannot commend it as a solution of our unemployment difficulties, but there is a good deal in it if we are to regard our Empire as one country, and if it is a question of emigration, and not a question of deportation. Australia might have had our millions, if we had had the foresight years ago to direct our stream of emigration to our own Empire. But we were afflicted with the curse of individualism in this country, and millions of our best blood have gone to other countries, while our own Empire has been neglected, when a little help, a little guidance, might have given Australia twice the population she has got to-day. The fault is not hers. The fault has been the traditional policy of our own Government. In, regard to the provision made for the care of emigrants, I will not say a word, because my hon. Friend the Member for the Forest of Dean (Mr. Wignall) has a close personal knowledge of that, and he will probably say a few words about it. But I think, considering all the difficulties, the arrangements for the reception of emigrants are as good as they can be made. Nobody is to blame for that. Members on all sides of the House have given earnest attention to these problems, and, as has been said to-night, the right hon. Member for Sparkbrook (Mr. Amery) has been specially active in this matter.
10.0 P.M.
There is one problem which has not been touched to-night, and I will mention that, because, after all, that is at the bottom of the whole question. It is whether the people will go or not. That is the real difficulty. We cannot blame them if they prefer their own home to somewhere else. However poor a man's
cottage may be, he prefers that cottage to some other man's palace. However pool his own country may be, he prefers that to the ampler opportunities of other lands. After all, we have encouraged him in that. That has been a part of our policy. In the Press, in the pulpit, on the platform, we have taught men to love their country to the point of death. Our workers and people of all classes did love their country to the point of death. Well, then, they do not want to leave it. They did not fight the War to make a home for heroes in Australia. They wanted opportunities in their own island. Somebody has said there is a
… spot of earth supremely blest, A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest.
And that spot is a man's own home. There may be other lands as fair, where people may be as kind, but they are not their fields and their people, and folk want to remain at home. So long as we can make it possible, our business should be to reorganise our own home affairs, so that men can live upon the soil of this country.
I will end by saying what I began by saying, that I would not say one word against opportunities being given for any young man of virility who voluntarily wanted to seek a home abroad in any part of our Empire. I know if I were a young man, and I had to choose between working on an English farm for a slave's wage, with the prospect of the Poor Law and pauperism in the end, and taking a man's chance of building a home in Australia, or somewhere else, I would not hesitate for a moment to do it. That is the real point, and so what we have to deal with to-night is to provide opportunities for those of our blood who want to take a man's chance and build a home in other parts of the Empire.

Mr. ACKROYD: There is one aspect of this question to which I venture to draw the attention of the House, and that is the aspect with regard to juvenile emigration. In pre-war days, as is well known, a number of well-established institutions sent large numbers of orphans and destitute children to Canada, and if the House will pardon a personal reference, I myself have been associated with a well-known philanthropic institution in Man-
chester, namely, the Boys' and Girls' Refuges and Homes, which had as one of its branches a home in Canada, and to this place every year many children from our own Man chester refuges, and from the various local boards of guardians, were emigrated every year, and that work, which was maintained for many years, I am bound to say, was eminently successful. I myself, having been greatly interested in this question of child emigration, have paid three visits to Canada, and have very carefully studied the condition of life for these children on the farms in Ontario. Therefore, I think I may claim indulgence for a few moments to state to this House what I myself discovered in Canada.
The object of my journey to Canada was to investigate on the spot the results of the work, and to judge the prospect of it for the future, and each time I returned to this country fully convinced of the wisdom and the value of child emigration. It was my pleasure and privilege to visit a very large number of Manchester boys and girls who had been placed on the farm homes in Canada. Wherever I went I was received with the greatest of kindness by the Canadian farmers. I myself saw these children under all circumstances, and, with one exception, these 'boys and girls were perfectly happy, and many expressed to me their sincere gratitude for having been sent to that country. As I say, they are in good homes, with an abundant supply of food and clothing, cared for and loved by those who have taken them; then, remembering them as I knew them on the streets and in the slums of Manchester, I contrasted their condition when rescued with what I saw of them, and I felt more than ever the value of this emigration system.
As is well known to the House, when the War came all emigration was stopped. It is only now beginning to be revived. I am quite aware that there are many people in this country who are not favourably disposed towards emigration, and especially towards child emigration, but I submit to the House that this is a question well worthy the serious consideration of the Government and all hon. Members. I realise, as other Members of the House realise. the importance of keeping the healthy and honest children
at home and preparing them for work in our own country. We all realise the importance of that. But I think we have to realise this, Chat there is a very large number of boys and girls who every year are left orphans, or destitute of friends or relatives. There are also many who are rescued every year from degrading surroundings for whom, I submit, emigration is the most desirable thing. These children are taken up by the Poor Law guardians, or are placed in voluntary homes, and it sometimes happens that after careful training, and when they are able to earn money, they are trapped back to these degrading, drunken and vicious surroundings. I am convinced that it is a fatal mistake to allow children who have been rescued from such conditions to again come into contact with them. Their salvation is to be found in being placed far away from all the baneful environment of their early life.
I, therefore, submit to the House that by some well-prepared and safely-guarded scheme of juvenile emigration we accomplish three most important things. First of all, we are preventing the children who have been saved from probably lapsing into the misery of their former life; secondly, we believe our own over-crowded centres of population, where the struggle for existence grows fiercer every day; and, thirdly—and this is a most important point to me—we are former life; secondly, we relieve our own British boys and girls who in a few years will become citizens of our great Empire.
May I, in conclusion, be permitted to dispel the idea, if it should now exist in the minds of anyone—as it certainly did in the early days of the movement—that these children are badly treated. I have made careful inquiries from the farmers, from the children themselves, and from various public officials as to the treatment of these boys and girls, and everywhere I was assured that they received every care and kindness. The employers themselves undertake to clothe the children properly, to send them to school during a certain period of the year, and to see that they attend church and Sunday school. I am prepared to admit in a few cases where land is being opened up and the farmer just beginning that the little emigrant may sometimes be treated with rough comfort, but he is always treated as one of the family. As
has already been said in the House, under the Empire Settlement Act, 1922, Parliament had given the Secretary of State considerable powers to formulate schemes, and co-operate in any agreed scheme of emigration to any part of our own overseas Dominions. Along with other Members who have spoken, I earnestly hope that the present Government will make full use of those powers. To-day we have half a million young people out of work. Thousands of them are unskilled, not learning any trade, and they are becoming demoralised at home. The problem as to where they are to go is a great one, and is becoming more difficult every day. These boys and girls are constantly adding to the ranks of unemployed. I suggest that one solution would be a well-organised scheme of training and emigration.

Mr. LUNN (Secretary, Department of Overseas Trade): I wish this had been a full day's Debate, because the subject merits a longer time for debate than it has had. I cannot complain at the tone of the speeches which have been delivered, but I should have liked many other hon. Members to have had the opportunity of expressing their opinions upon this subject. I thank the hon. Member for York-(Sir J. Marriott) for having given me this opportunity of stating, for the first time, what is the policy of a Labour Government in this country on this subject. it is a thorny subject for a Labour man—or has been in past days. We have never been, I believe, too enthusiastic on this subject. If hon. Members noticed the speech yesterday of my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Morley (Mr. Turner) they would note his remarks to the effect that, instead of sending our people overseas, we had plenty of land in this country, and (he said) they should be settled here.

Mr. WRIGHT: We have plenty of land!

Mr. LUNN: That observation of my hon. Friend has been slightly modified by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for North-West Camberwell (Dr. Macnamara) and by the hon. Member for East Woolwich (Mr. Snell), in saying that we should take dual responsibility to see that we utilise what we have in this country more than what it is utilised to-day to place our people on the land, and we should also consider the other point: how
far it is possible to find homes in the Dominions for people who do desire to go from this country to any other part of the Empire. There is also the necessary qualification to what has been said about doing our duty, and that is to realise our responsibility to the Dominions. I hope that, as a result of the Empire Labour Conference, which is to be held in London next August—and now Labour Governments are being elected, not only in this country, but in many other parts of the Dominions—that such a Conference will help to cement the bonds of mutual service and kindly comradeship between the mother-country and other parts of the Empire. The subject has become a fascinating subject to me since I became Chairman of the Oversea Settlement Committee. It is, too, one of the astonishing things, after being in politics for many years, to find that Governments before the War did nothing to assist migration to any part of the Empire. It took a devastating war to awaken this country to its sense of a responsibility from a Government point of view, and after the War the subject was largely left to voluntary agencies. I wish to re-echo what the hon. Member for York said when he paid a well-merited compliment to the voluntary societies for the work they have done in days gone by, and for the good work they are doing at present in this direction. It was after the War that we first had a. Committee under the auspices of the Government taking any part in this matter. As has been said, their first scheme was to send overseas some 50,000 ex-service men with their dependants, bringing the total somewhere near 100,000 persons.
This Committee is still working, and it is an excellent Committee. It is composed of men and women who know the Dominions very well indeed, who have lived there, and been there a great deal. Not having had an opportunity yet of visiting any part of the Dominions myself, I value much their aid and help in this direction. We have also representatives of the various Government Departments, and they are very anxious to give whatever assistance can be given in order to take advantage of what has been decided by Parliament with regard to the migration of people overseas. With regard to the position of migration from this
country, I was a little astonished at the statement made by the Seconder of this Motion, because it was certainly very wide of the mark to say that we ought to have propaganda in this country to urge our people to go overseas. There is no need for it, because there are far more people to-day who are desirous of going overseas than we are able to cope with.
I cannot follow the line taken by previous chairmen of the Oversea Settlement Committee, and what has been said in one speech in this Debate to-day. I say, first and foremost, that our policy, if we have to assist migration from this country to any part of the Empire, should be family migration or groups of families. If the husband wants to go to the Dominions, means must be found to enable the mother and the children to go as well. Any scheme must be based on co-operation with the Dominions who are concerned. My right hon. Friend the Member for Sparkbrook (Mr. Amery) is an apostle of this subject, and has often taken part in these Debates. When he introduced the Empire Settlement Bill he had great hopes that schemes would be organised which would utilise £1,500,000 in the first year and £3,000,000 in the succeeding 14 years. He showed great optimism at that time, for he said:
I believe before very long we shall regard the amount now proposed as quite inadequate for so great and so remunerative a task."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 26th April, 1922; col. 584, Vol. 153.]
For instance, he mentioned that, so far as Western Australia was concerned, they might take 75,000 persons, men, women and children, in five years, or 15,000 a year; whereas they have only taken, up to the 30th April, 4,394, and the scheme is now temporarily closed down. The scheme for Victoria, which was arranged after the Empire Settlement Act was passed, provided for the taking of 2,000 farmers in 12 months, but only 200 have bean enabled to go; and New South Wales, which was to take 6,000 in five years, has taken practically none. As regards those two schemes, there is no doubt that one thing which has prevented suitable people from going 'has been the need that they should have capital of their own, and it is a matter for consideration whether the schemes now in existence could not with advantage to all parties be improved upon, and new ones estab-
fished, to provide for people 'who are without capital except healthy bodies and good characters, which are invaluable capital. Then my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal, who has been quoted in this Debate, spoke on the Second Reading of the Empire Settlement Bill, and he, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for North-West Camberwell said, has been a great supporter of this idea ever since I came into this House, at all events, that is since 1919. He said, in supporting it:
While I congratulate my hon. Friend upon his belief in the virtues of this Measure …. I fear he may be disappointed in the ultimate consequences of its general working."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th April, 1922; col. 592, Vol. 153.]
As was said by the hon. Member for York, in his long and interesting and informative speech, we have only spent something like £452,000 out of the £4,500,000 which it was expected would be spent in connection with this matter during the first two years. If we are to base our position on the estimate made two years ago, the progress that has been made has certainly been disappointingly slow; but I would rather that 55,000 people—that is the number assisted up to the 31st March—should go with the full co-operation of the Dominions, and that they should be settled happily, with work provided for them which will give them the opportunity to live, than that we should dump down half a million people in any country without regard to their future. The excellent Report, which has just been published, of the delegation who went to Australia, says:
We do not think it would be right to bring pressure to bear which might lead to the acceptance by the States of numbers beyond those to which they are confident of doing justice,
and I agree absolutely with them in that. If people have to go, there must be provision overseas for receiving and settling them, and this matter must be dealt with by co-operation and common understanding between this Government and the Dominion Governments. This question, I believe, has never been considered as a cure for unemployment. I am astonished to hear what has been said in this Debate' on that subject. The present Government do not look upon it in any sense as a cure for unemployment. The right hon. Gentleman, when he introduced the Bill, stated definitely that this was not a panacea for
the immediate crisis of unemployment; but I believe myself that, if you take the long view, it has a most important bearing on our future trade relations with the Dominions. I would quote in confirmation of that a paragraph from a speech made by Lord Milner at a Conference in 1921. He said:
Oversea settlements should not be regarded as a means of relieving abnormal unemployment, but that it can, if wisely directed and supervised, he of the greatest value in minimising future risks of unemployment by stimulating primary production overseas and thus providing foodstuffs for the people of this country, raw materials for their manufactories and safe markets for their manufacturers.
With that I agree, if we take full advantage and take the long view.
Again, all schemes which may be arranged under this Act must be on a 50-50 basis, and I think those who have had anything to do with the subject realise that we must keep closely to that position. I heard a story the other day of a young man who was leaving his girl one night, and she said, "Shall we go to the pictures to-morrow?" Being a little short of money he said he did not mind, but it would be on a 50-50 basis. The young lady, feeling she might have him to herself in the shadows of the cinema for an hour or two, agreed. But when he turned up next night with another young lady and wished to take her as well on a 50-50 basis she objected. I am quite confident if you wish to stretch the Act to that point there would be very strong objections. I find great willingness on the part of the Dominion High Commissioners and Agents-General to cooperate on these lines. They have great difficulty in settling larger numbers. It can be truly said that we have large numbers of families, and groups of families, in our own country who are wanting to go overseas, and it is for the Dominions to make it possible for them to settle satisfactorily. They can count on our co-operation, and I accept the second part of the Resolution to the full extent of the Empire Settlement Act. In Devon and Cornwall there is a committee already at work. There are hundreds of families in that area who are desirous of being assisted overseas, but only 70 families have been assisted. Then my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for North-East Leeds (Major Birchall) last autumn interested himself in this subject,
and in a few days no fewer than 500 families from Leeds applied to be assisted to go to Western Australia. There have only been 20 of these families provided for up to date. If families want to go, I say we should help to the utmost of our power, but there must be proper schemes for their reception when they arrive and also employment on fair conditions, and a reasonable chance of success.
The present Government accepted the Resolution of the Economic Conference and will continue to give effect by administrative action to the policy of oversea settlement as embodied in the Empire Settlement Act. I have gone into the schemes since I became chairman and I have discussed them with the Australian representatives. There is no doubt that the comparatively slow progress of land settlement schemes arranged with various States is due to the financial basis, i.e., to the payment of only one-third of the interest on their loans for five years and the necessity for migrants to have capital. After discussing the whole question of settlement development in Australia with Mr. Theodore, the Premier of Queensland, and later with Senator Wilson, the Commonwealth Minister for Immigration, we have offered, with the concurrence of the Treasury, to pay one-half of the interest for a period of five years on loans not exceeding £20,000,000, in addition to the loans which may be raised in the Commonwealth under existing schemes, together with one-third of the interest for a further period of five years. It is contemplated that these loans will be raised in instalments over a period of 10 years. It is stipulated that for each £1,000 of loan money the Australian Government should undertake to settle at least one family, without capital, averaging five persons, together with five other assisted emigrants, men, women and children, the Commonwealth Government to undertake to reorganise and place on a proper basis the existing arrangements for the reception, training, settlement, after-care and housing of the new settlers, under Government supervision.
That offer is now made to the Commonwealth Government to enable them to make attractive offers to the various States, and it is being conveyed to Australia by Senator Wilson. I hope
that it will be considered by them sufficiently attractive to take advantage of it. It is very generous. It is within the terms of the Settlement Act, and, in view of the excellent and useful reports of the delegation, presided over by Sir William Wyndham, to whom the House and myself in particular must be deeply grateful, I hope they will give the offer serious consideration. If full advantage be taken of the offer, it should provide for something between 400,000 to 500,000 new settlers in Australia from this country in the next 10 years. If this can be done, it will be for the mutual advantage of our own country, the Commonwealth of Australia, and the families and groups of families who go there. Australia seems to be the most hopeful of all the Dominions, and has occupied the largest place in the speeches of hon. Members. As to New Zealand, I have heard a great deal during the last few months, and the opinion is freely expressed that this Dominion is the most ideal country for the British settler. Some 10,000 people were expected to go there, but there has only been something like 7,000 people who have gone there during the last year.
Canada has not come much into this Debate, although the hon. Member for Moss Side (Mr. Ackroyd) dealt with the question of children. That is one of the difficulties in connection with the subject of emigration. Most Members of Parliament, or many Members, have probably received more letters in regard to child migration to Canada than in respect of any other form of migration. I have gone into this question and have endeavoured to see whether it were possible to arrange schemes with Canada for migration of families and groups of families. The first group scheme that has been arranged with Canada has been arranged during the last few weeks with the Canadian National Railway but in these schemes they ask that those who go should have a, capital of £200. In that way I am sure that they are not going to get the settlers who ought to go out to Canada. I would like to see some offer made and taken advantage of by Canada, such as the offer we have made to Australia, in regard to encouraging families to go out.
I do not look upon schemes of migration of single men and single women as ideal schemes. I cannot imagine that men going from this country, from
Piccadilly, the lights of London, the theatres and cinemas here, are going to make the best and most successful settlers on the land in the Dominions. So I should like to see more done to encourage the wife and children to go out, and to enable these families to go without capital. I believe that there is a possibility of arranging a scheme with Canada, which will enable the family to go as a whole and be settled properly as we would desire. With regard to children it has been interesting to listen to the hon. Member for Moss Side, but I do believe that if this bad been a day's Debate we might have heard other opinions with regard to the migration of children to Canada.
There were one or two untoward incidents which happened just at the time when I became Chairman of this Committee. I do not wish to exaggerate the importance of such incidents, but as a result we set on foot an inquiry in this country and appointed two members of the Committee to go carefully into the question of the selection of children, as there must be careful selection of children who are to go. Canada last year asked for 17,500 children and something like 1,100 went, so that it should be possible to select and secure good homes for the children. Every home, I understand, is inspected by a Government representative and by a representative of the voluntary society, but this is a, delicate matter as I know that there are objections from many Members of this House and from many parts of the country to this form of migration.
At the invitation of the Canadian Government, we are to send a delegation to Canada to enquire into the placing of children and the system of inspection. I am pleased to announce that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour will act as Chairman of the delegation, so I ask the House to await their Report.
There are many other points, such as the position of the voluntary societies, which is an important factor which will have to be considered in this particular business in future, the development of the nomination system, which is perhaps the best system, the migration of public schoolboys, and other matters, with which I would have liked to deal, but I am such
a lover of home and family myself that I have determined to do what I can to break down any barriers which stand in the way, and to plead if necessary with all our Dominions who need population to encourage families or groups of families as the best method of migration. Those who go there will attract others and become the best propagandists for Empire development.
It is our duty to consider this question not in any narrow sense, and to endeavour to see if we cannot co-operate to the full one with another in order to take full advantage. Let us make this a greater Empire, or commonwealth of nations, than it is to-day, brothers and sisters with a common language, common understanding, and common helpfulness towards each other for the removal of our difficulties. Whilst I say that, I do not forget that there are other countries outside the British Empire, that beyond the British Empire we want to see the League of Nations become a league of all nations, and that what we are seeking to do is not to establish the enmity of any nation, but peace throughout the world and the brotherhood of mankind.
I have no reason whatever to be disappointed with what has taken place as a result of the Empire Settlement Act. As soon as I took office as Chairman of the Committee, the scheme moved more quickly. The numbers who have gone out in the first four months of this year are 50 per cent. higher than the total of those who went out in the first four months of last year, and the scheme is moving on much sounder lines than in the past. I hope, therefore, that the House will agree that we are desirous of helping those 'of oar people who want to go. We have no desire to dump any c f them anywhere where they do not want to go. If they are to be unemployed, it, is better that they should be unemployed among their own friends at home than that they should be employed in any part of the world where they have no friends. Whatever we can do to assist those who want to go, to arrange with the Dominions schemes which will assist people to go, and whatever we can do to secure for those of our people who desire to go that they shall be cared for and provided with employment and homes, we will do. I accept the last part of this Resolution on behalf of the Government.

Mr. AMERY: The very sympathetic speech of the hon. Gentleman shows clearly that any failure there may have been to develop this policy to the full extent that some of us had hoped, has been due to no want of interest or enthusiasm on the part of the hon. Member or the Government. In view of his speech and of the interesting facts he has told us, and of the way in which he has accepted the whole spirit of this Resolution, I hope that my hon. Friend who brought the Resolution forward will accept the Minister's answer with satisfaction and not press his Motion to a Division. I am sure that if there have been difficulties and delays, they have not been, in the main, at this end; they have been due to conditions in the Dominions. The Dominion Governments have found in many cases—I might almost say in every case—that the actual problem of carrying out a scheme satisfactorily was greater than they anticipated, and, rightly, they prefer to carry out their scheme well rather than carry it out on too ambitious a scale. The very interesting Report of the delegation that went to Austalia shows how satisfactorily the work has been done. That is far better than that twice the number should have gone and the result have been failure for the individual concerned. I will ask one question in that connection. I hope it may also be possible for General Wauchope's Report on the special aspect of the matter in reference to ex-service men, to be published.

Mr. LUNN: Its purport will be published.

Mr. AMERY: The really important thing is that settlement should be on satisfactory lines. If it is, then it will rapidly increase. If I may venture to differ from my hon. friend the Member for North Islington (Sir H. Cowan), I doubt if it is desirable to over-advertise settlement until the conditions are ripe for it. The important thing, and the thing which is going to lead to the biggest development in the long run, is that our methods should be right. The right hon. Member for North-West Camberwell (Dr. Macnamara) spoke of the unsatisfactory nature of past migration work. It was the spirit behind the work that was wrong. It was so often that spirit to which the hon. Member for East Wool-
wich (Mr. Snell) referred, the spirit of blood-letting, of thinking you were going to get rid of a surplus physically and get rid of your moral responsibility as well. That is an absolutely wrong view to take of the problem. The conception which I, at any rate, had in mind in connection with the Empire Settlement Act was that it was a means of retaining and extending our responsibility to those who went overseas, as well as for those who remain at home. The object of contributing money is in no small measure to give us the right to have some say in the condition under which settlers are dealt with on their arrival in their new home. The conception which we ought to keep in mind is that if there are citizens of our country who wish to find homes in the Empire outside, our responsibility goes with them, and we still wish to ensure not only that there are good arrangements made for their selection, voyage and on their arrival, but that the arrangements afterwards should be such as to ensure their success.
That is essential, and I hope it is from that point of view alone that the House will look upon this policy. I entirely agree with the hon. Member for East Woolwich in deprecating the idea that this is a panacea to the exclusion of other
remedies. If we want to give opportunities for happy homes and a prosperous future to our citizens if they go to the Dominions, that is not as an alternative to endeavouring to find happy homes and better opportunities for them in our own country. On the contrary, we have to accept both of these tasks, and probably it will be said that out task at home is the greater and the more urgent of the two. My conception is that the two go together and are largely complementary to each other. May I take as a parallel the similar problem of social reform which exists in our great cities. It has been the almost universal experience of social reformers in municipal matters that it has been necessary for them to enlarge the scale of their operations. They have had to enlarge the boundaries of their cities for their town-planning schemes. It was never meant by that that they should neglect the slum problem in the hearts of the cities. On the contrary, town planning work on the outskirts of our cities has made it easier to deal with the problem of the congested districts in the centre. To my mind the importance of
this work, this town planning on an Empire scale, is that just as we create better and happier conditions in the Dominions for those of our citizens who wish to go to the Dominions, so we will be able also with better opportunities, but certainly with the same intensity of purpose, to deal with the more pressing problem of home life within this country.
The same applies to the problem of unemployment. I entirely agree that we cannot regard Empire settlement as an immediate panacea for an abnormal condition of unemployment. We have to deal with our unemployed because they are un- employed. We send people or help them to go across the seas, not because they are unemployed, but because they have a chance of succeeding. To that extent the two problems are different. But what is true is that to whatever extent the movement of our people overseas relieves unemployment it relieves it in a very satisfactory manner. The man who settles overseas is like a man who crosses the Floor of this House. He counts two in a division. Not only does he case the problem here, but his custom to this country helps the economic situation of those who remain. It is from that point of view and not from the point of view of this year or next year, not from the point of view of years of unemployment any more than from the point of view of years of good employment, that we want to persevere with this work.
The whole trouble in this country has been that our economic life is unbalanced and is so much at the mercy of disturbances in other countries beyond our control. The more we can widen our economic basis and spread our people in the Empire the greater our insurance against fluctuations in the world outside. We do not want to lessen our foreign trade any more than our general interest in the world, but the wider our own basis the greater our security. There is really, in my opinion, no limit to the advantages which in the long run will follow this policy if wisely pursued. It is the real foundation of Empire and domestic prosperity in the future. There is no reason why we should not attain the same kind of prosperity and the same standard of life which the United States have attained. They have spread their people over a great rich territory. We can do the same. We cannot do it in a moment, we have to do it
in co-operation with the Dominion Governments. We have to advance steadily, though I agree we should try to advance more rapidly than at present. The great thing is that we should do it on right lines and from the right point of view, as simply social reform writ, large and dealing with the whole problem of national life on a wider scale.

Mr. WIGNALL: I should have liked to have had the opportunity of going very fully into the subject before the House, and giving explanations as to the slow ness of the progress made by the Oversea Settlement Committee, but the time 'has been taken up, and there is no opportunity for me to deal very largely with the question as I should have liked to have done. There is an entirely different aspect of affairs when you look at it from the spot which is affected and when you look at things exactly as they are and mix among the people and understand the position from their view point. First of all, we must not forget that our Dominions are self-governing Dominions, and that they have the right to say who shall, or shall not enter through their gates. We cannot, and have no r4ght, and I hope will never attempt to claim the right, of putting people there against the consent of the Dominion itself. Our operations were joint operations by agreement, and the very duty of the delegation was to investigate into the various matters as they were developing, and to report accordingly.
The first thing that amazed me in Australia was the land question. Beautiful speeches have been delivered suggesting that this land was free to anybody who chose to go upon it and peg out their claim and settle down. It was said that no one would disturb them. I travelled hundreds and hundreds of miles across the country, even into the back country, and I asked those who guided us, "What is the reason for these wires along the roadside on both sides?" "That is private property" was the answer. I said I should like to be shown some land that was not private property. The fact is that the land is in the hands of large landowners and syndicates and trusts, and to a great extent it is held for profit and sold at the highest possible price to be obtained. The difficulty that the State Government has had in developing their plans has been to buy
sufficient land to develop on the lines they desire. We found, particularly in New Zealand, where the Government have purchased huge tracts of land for settlement that the same thing applies. In the States of Australia prices have gone up so high, and men settling on the land have had to pay such high prices, that the whole thing has proved unremunerative and unproductive. They cannot make it pay. I have looked at these men struggling hard to make their little farms profitable. They are men who sacrificed themselves in the War, men who lost fathers and brothers to free this land from the aggressor, and now they are being called upon to pay such exorbitant prices that it is impossible for them to make a living on the land. That is one of the great difficulties we have to face in working out the Oversea Settlement scheme as rapidly as we would like to.
Another difficulty is that in the States of Australia the cities are overcrowded, there is a shortage of houses, and people are drifting back from the country and thus helping to make the trouble still greater. We have a great deal of unemployment in this country, but they have got their unemployed problem in Australia, not so great as ours, but in proportion, quite as serious. The very first meeting I was called upon to address in Melbourne was a meeting of the unemployed. In Sydney, when I arrived there, I was surprised to find that they had
20,000 unemployed. [An HON. MEMBER: "Are there any unemployed in agriculture?"] Of course there are. Does the House know that a farmer only employs labour about two seasons in the year, for ploughing and for harvesting, and that during the remainder of the year the men are unemployed? That is one cause of the failure of land settlement. There is no employment to give these people at certain periods of the year.

It being Eleven of the Clock, the Debate stood adjourned.

ELECTRICITY (SUPPLY) ACTS.

Resolved,
That the Order made by the Electricity Commissioners and confirmed by the Minister of Transport under Section 7 of the Electricity (Supply) Act, 1919, constituting the East Midlands Electricity District and establishing the East Midlands Electricity Advisory Board, which was presented on the 7th day of April, 1924, be approved."—[Mr. Gosling.]

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

ADJOURNMENT.

Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Parkinson.]

Adjourned accordingly at Four Minutes after Eleven o'Clock.